Felder Community Hospital

The Length of Stay (LOS) in a medical care perspective takes into consideration the number of days that a patient spends in the institution, especially the Emergency Department. Patients who stay for long in individual sections in a medical care institution usually have adverse health outcomes because of not being allowed to get healed in the fastest time possible. Felder Community Hospital is one of these institutions where the LOS is prolonged. It is a 600-bed facility serving a large metropolitan area. The senior management at the institution has made it a mandate of all departments to implement quarterly training for employees. The Health Information Management staff needs to understand the statistics of the institution for May and June and provide an ethics review for staff training that applies to data analysis and research. The essence of exploring the use factors is to improve the delivery of medical care to all individuals within the context of the institution. 

Part A 

A difference exists between discrete and continuous data. Discrete data contains separate or distinct variables, and it is countable. Contrariwise, continuous data contains all values within a range, and it is measurable. As such, it falls under a continuous sequence. Nominal data can be sorted out into discrete values that cannot overlap, such as gender, which can be male or female. Ordinal data is categorical, which implies that it can be ordered into a range such as economic status (Petrie & Sabin, 2019). Ratio data is a variable featuring intervals of two values that relate to each other to make operations of division and multiplication meaningful such as age and enzyme activity. Interval data has significant difference and order between different variables such as the temperature of a patient. 

Part B 

Average LOS 

The average LOS in the medical care institution is three days for the month of May and three days for June. It is calculated by dividing the combined LOS with the discharged patients for each month where the discharged patients include the deaths of the patients during the specific month. 

ALOS (MAY) = 13,965/ (4,360 + 62) = 3.158073 

ALOS (JUNE) = 16,224/ (4,920 + 15) = 3.287538 

Death Rate 

The death rate of patients for the month of May is 1.4% while for the month of June is 0.3%. They have been computed as indicated below. 

Average Daily Inpatient Census Report 

The average daily inpatient census report for the month of May is 450 patients while for the month of June are 540 patients. The total number of patients rendered in the month of May is 13,965 while the number of days in the month is 31 hence when the number of patients rendered is divided by the number of days in the month; the average daily inpatient census report is obtained. Likewise, for the month of June the same formula was applied with 16,224 patients rendered within 30 days of the month to attain the above stated average daily inpatient census report. 

Part C: Regression Analysis 

The regression analysis depicts 18 degrees of freedom and significance of 0.000451797. The confidence level used is 95%. The report is given on an MS Excel worksheet attached. 

How Felder Community Hospital Could Use the Statistical Data Calculated in Parts B and C to Improve Healthcare Delivery 

Felder Community Hospital should use the statistics to improve its medical care delivery. It needs to reduce the average LOS as well as the death rate of patients. The medical care institutions should attempt to ensure that the amount of time that patients spend in the medical care institution is reduced significantly. The medical care institution needs to consider the plight of each of the persons involved in the healthcare context (Harman & Cornelius, 2017). As such, information needs to be shared fast and discreetly between the HIM professionals to ensure that the patients are healed at a faster rate, and thereby reduce the number of deaths as well as the LOS. So far, the LOS and the death rates are very low as per the statistics but with faster and discreet sharing of patient information, the rates can be brought lower. 

AHIMA Code of Ethics 

After the initiation of the American College of Surgeons in 1913, a mechanism was sought by which to review the work of the surgeons. In 1928, through a conference the standards for medical records were elevated. Yet, it was in 1991 that the name American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA) was adopted. Due to the constant reviews, the AHIMA Code of Ethics draws a correlation with HIM professional conduct by establishing a set of principles that are ethical and necessary in guiding the actions and decision making process. Moreover, there is provision of virtuous principles that empower the public that through the codes can hold HIM professionals liable for their actions (AHIMA, 2016). Thus, the principles from the AHIMA Code of Ethics can be applied in the advancement of health information through continuous education and research within the health institution. 

HIPAA regulations can be applied to the research performed in the scenario through proper documentation of the processes analogues. Moreover, through the implementation of the administrative, physical, and technical safeguards, the institution stands to reduce the average length of stay of the patients to a much lower figure of one day while the death rate can be reduced to zero. Therefore, through the HIPAA regulations, Felder Community Hospital will attain high level of confidentiality in the handling of patient information, portability of the insurance, and simplification of administrative roles among other benefits. 

References 

AHIMA. (2016). Standards of Ethical Coding. AHIMA Body of Knowledge. 

Harman, L., & Cornelius, F. (2017). Ethical Health Informatics: Challenges and Opportunities. 3rd ed. Burlington, Massachusetts: Jones & Bartlett Learning. 

Petrie, A., & Sabin, C. (2019). Medical statistics at a glance. John Wiley & Sons.