Trauma center closures linked with higher mortality for local injured patients

Injured patients who live near a closed trauma center have higher in-hospital morality rates once they reach a hospital, according to a study conducted by University of California, San Francisco researchers and published in The Journal of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery.

In their study on the impact of three closed trauma centers in California, investigators discovered that injured patients who had to travel farther to reach an open trauma center had 21% higher odds of in-hospital mortality compared to injured patients who did not have to travel farther for trauma care. According to a University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) press release, the odds of in-patient mortality increase to 29% during the first 2 years after a closure.

“This study confirms that when trauma centers close, people who live in the surrounding areas are more likely to die following an injury,” Renee Y. Hsia, MD, lead author of the study and associate professor of emergency medicine at UCSF, stated in a UCSF press release. “There have been an increasing number of trauma center closures in recent years, and these closures are associated with a higher risk of death in the affected communities.”

Hsia and colleagues compared patients whose travel time to their nearest trauma center increased to those with no change in travel time, as well as those whose travel time to trauma care decreased after a trauma center opened nearby. When travel time to the closest trauma center decreased, there was 17% drop in the odds of in-hospital mortality compared to the group experiencing no change in travel time. Increased travel time was associated with 14% higher odds of in-hospital mortality, according to the press release.

Reference:

www.ucsf.edu

Disclosure: Hsia received support for the study through the KL2 scholars grant through the UCSF Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Physician Faculty Scholars Program.