Hospital death rate down more than 9% since 2014

A death rate for hospital patients across Scotland has fallen by more than 9% in four years, new figures show.

The hospital standardised mortality ratio (HSMR) is down 9.2% between January to March 2014 and the same period this year.

The Scottish Patient Safety Programme aims to reduce hospital mortality by 10% by the end of the 2018.

From the 29 hospitals included in the figures, 22 reduced HSMR since January to March 2014.

For 11 of these the reduction is more than the 10% target.

These are Ayr, Crosshouse, Dumfries and Galloway, Forth Valley, Inverclyde, Hairmyres, Monklands, Wishaw, Balfour, Western Isles Hospital and Queen Elizabeth University Hospital combined with Gartnavel.

The ratio is based on all acute inpatient and day case patients admitted to hospital who died within 30 days from admission.

It is adjusted to account for some of the factors known to affect the underlying risk of death.

The Scottish HSMR for January to March 2018 is 0.94 meaning there were 6% fewer deaths in the period than predicted, the same as the previous three months.

No hospitals had a significantly higher ratio in this period than the national average.

One hospital, the Western General in Edinburgh had a significantly lower ratio at 0.76.

Possible factors contributing to the overall nationwide reduction could include changes in underlying population-based mortality, the level of care, available medical treatments and the completeness and accuracy of hospital discharge summaries

A Scottish Government spokesman welcomed the continuing decrease.

He said: “It is particularly encouraging that we continue to see 11 out of 29 hospitals with a decrease of more than 10% - with this data again covering the winter months when there is a likelihood of an increase in unpredicted deaths.

“This comes at a time when our NHS is treating more people, with more complex needs than ever before. We want to go further, and the decade of hard work by the Scottish Safety Programme shows that we are continuing to lead the way on patient safety, with other countries looking to learn from our approach.'