Variability in clinical practice for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in outpatient clinics

Objectives: At the moment no studies have evaluated a clinical audit of clinical practice in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in the outpatient visits so far. This work is a first pilot project that aims to assess the variability of clinical practice for COPD in this care setting through a clinical audit. Methods: Pilot medical record audit conducted in specialised outpatient Pneumology clinic from 9 public hospitals in Andalusia (Spain) between October 2013 and September 2014. The project goal was to audit 80 cases per centre distributed over the year. The information was collected by standardized questionnaire with 182 variables. The data are described in means and inter-hospital ranges to evaluate between centres variability. Results: During study analysed 621 stories. Patients were mostly men, in the seventh decade of life, with a percentage of current smokers of 26.2%, a considerable number of comorbidities and mostly the urban area. The data indicate that health care is generally correct as average but indicating areas for improvement in some points and considerable variability between centres with significant differences (p Conclusions: Health care COPD patients in outpatient Pneumology clinics shows considerable variability that probably cannot be explained only by the patient9s clinical condition. Future studies should elucidate which factors influence this variability.