Hospital deaths dashboard: care indicators

Area of Science:

• Medical quality improvement
• Palliative care research
• Healthcare data analytics

Background:

• Assessing the quality of end-of-life care is crucial.
• Existing audit tools may not be easily integrated into daily practice.
• A need exists for a streamlined method to monitor end-of-life care quality in teaching hospitals.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a medical/nursing-led data collection tool for ongoing audits of end-of-life care quality.
• To create a visual summary of key care indicators, including medication use, recognition of death, treatment escalation plans, and communication.
• To establish surrogate indicators for high-quality end-of-life care.

Main Methods:

• Designed a purpose-built spreadsheet, adapted from UK national audit tools.
• Involved medical trainees to refine data collection for efficiency.
• Developed a simple training guide for straightforward rollout and maintenance.

Main Results:

• Collected data from 100 cases over six months (August 2019 - January 2020).
• Developed a dashboard visualizing core end-of-life care elements.
• Found near 100% completion for communication with family/friends and most other aspects, except treatment escalation planning.

Conclusions:

• The developed tool serves as a valuable ongoing indicator of end-of-life care quality.
• The tool facilitates timely quarterly feedback through infographics.
• Encourages adoption by other hospital teams to identify trends and improve care.