Research published by The BMJ suggests inaccurate coding may be to blame for the "weekend effect" — or theory that patients admitted during the weekend are more likely to die than those admitted during the week — for various medical conditions.
The "weekend effect" has been the source of considerable debate in the medical community as of late. For instance, two studies recently published in The Lancet suggest the spike in hospital mortality rates and dip in care quality may not be as simple as previous research has suggested, which tends to blame staffing levels.
According to the BMJ study, which was led by researchers from Oxford University in the United Kingdom, it may have something to do with the accuracy of coding data, since many "weekend effect" studies use hospital administrative data.
Based on coding data for more than 90,000 acute stroke admissions between 2002 and 2014, there was a gap in the accuracy of the administrative data recorded during the weekend and during the weekdays.
One such example includes low-risk, pre-planned admissions, which were frequently miscoded as an acute stroke, a condition that tends to have a higher mortality rate. These low-risk admissions occurred more often during the week, creating an apparent "weekend effect" for strokes in the coding data.
Also this week, The BMJ released an explanation for its rejection of a "weekend effect" study authored by health economist Rachel Meacock.
More articles on the weekend effect:
More donor kidneys go to waste on the weekends
'Weekend effect' not so simple, studies find
Chuck Lauer: How are you combating the "weekend effect?"