statistics
The Malaga hospital always aims to have between 10 and 20 per cent of its beds free to cover any eventuality
31.07.08 - 18:01 -
Hospitals are finding that more and more of their beds are being occupied by patients with chronic illnesses, many of them elderly people with more than one complaint. In the case of the Hospital Clínico in Malaga at the times of peak demand around 85 per cent of the beds are taken up by patients with chronic problems. This at times can have a negative effect on the hospital’s surgery capacity as in some cases there are no beds available for patients scheduled to have an operation.
The root to the problem is that there are no specialised centres that can take in patients with chronic problems and so they are admitted to hospitals such as the Clínico when they can no longer fend for themselves at home. The alternative would be to improve home help for this type of patient to reduce the numbers requiring hospital care.
Of all of the patients admitted to the Clínico last year, 67 per cent entered via the accident and emergency department and of them, between 86 and 88 per cent suffered chronic illnesses. Another figure worth noting is that 35 per cent of patients admitted to the Clínico, had been in hospital at least twice previously.
The most frequent causes for a chronic patient to be admitted to hospital are cardiovascular problems (49%) or infections (11.95%).
During 2007 an average of 89.2% of beds in the Clínico were occupied an any one time, a figure that is slightly higher than in previous years: 87% in 2006 and 84% in 2005. “We always aim to leave between 10 and 20 per cent of beds free to be able to deal with any eventuality”, said hospital sources.
Last year a total of 2,689 patients were admitted to the Clínico Hospital. Of them 14,412 were emergency cases and 6,277 were programmed admissions. The average stay was 9.1 days.
