[Benchmarking in gastrointestinal endoscopy]

Quality and costs of endoscopic procedures in gastroenterology have recently come into focus of professionals and patients alike. The project presented here combines benchmarking of indicators of quality and simultaneous assessment of costs in departments of endoscopy. In all 9400 examinations from 14 departments were analysed. First and most obvious results are presented: the machine-readable data sheet was filled out correctly in 95 % (compulsory data fields); endoscopy costs differed by factor two for diagnostic gastroscopy and by factor five for therapeutic ERCP; in some departments a polypectomy was performed in up to every second diagnostic colonoscopy while in others polypectomy occurred only in 10 % in some departments patient monitoring like pulse oxymetry was used only in half of the procedures. Interpretation of the data requires further validation by resumption of the project to obtain more data from possibly more departments.