Special articleAre physicians aware of which of their patients have indwelling urinary catheters?
Section snippets
Study sample and design
The physicians (ie, attending physician and resident) and medical students responsible for patients admitted to the general medicine wards at four university-affiliated medical centers (three Veterans Affairs medical centers and one university hospital) were the subjects of the study. All sites were in the United States; two were in the Midwest, one in California, and one in the Pacific Northwest. All sites were actively involved in internal medicine residency training and medical school
Results
A total of 56 medical teams were surveyed at the four sites. Each team usually consisted of one attending physician, one or two residents, one or two interns, and up to four medical students. On average, there were 9 patients per team (range, 4 to 17). Of 288 possible respondents, 256 (89%) completed the survey, including 76 of 82 medical students, 72 of 83 interns, 59 of 67 residents, and 49 of 56 attending physicians.
Discussion
The results of this survey demonstrate that physicians and medical students were often unaware that their inpatients had an indwelling urinary catheter. This survey also confirmed previous studies showing that indwelling urinary catheters are often used inappropriately 14, 15. An important new finding is that these inappropriately used catheters were much more often “forgotten” than the appropriate ones.
We also found that as the provider’s training level increased, his or her awareness of a
Acknowledgements
We are indebted to the medical students, housestaff, and faculty who participated in this evaluation; to Rodney Hayward, MD, Carol Chenoweth, MD, Peter Jensen, MD, and Carol Kauffman, MD, for guidance; and to Veronica McCarthy for data entry.
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