Abstract 11781: Association of Rapid Response Teams With Hospital Mortality in Medicare Patients

Background: Rapid response teams (RRT) have been promoted as a strategy to reduce unexpected hospital deaths, as they are designed to evaluate and treat patients experiencing sudden decline. However, evidence to support their effectiveness in reducing in-hospital mortality remains uncertain. Methods: Using data from 56 hospitals participating in Get With The Guidelines Resuscitation linked to Medicare, we calculated annual rates of case-mix adjusted mortality for each hospital during 2000-2014. We constructed a hierarchical interrupted time series model to determine whether implementation of a RRT was associated with a reduction in mortality that was larger than expected based on pre-implementation trends alone. Results: Over the study period, the median annual number of Medicare admissions across study hospitals was 5214 (range: 408-18,398). The median duration of the pre-implementation period was 7.6 years comprising ~2.5 million admissions, and the median duration of the post-implementation period was 7.2 years comprising ~2.6 million admissions. Before implementation of RRTs, hospital mortality was already decreasing by 2.7% annually (Figure). Implementation of RRTs was not associated with change in mortality in the initial year of implementation (RR for model intercept: 0.98; 95% CI 0.94-1.02; P= 0.30) or in the mortality trend over time (RR for model slope: 1.01 per-year; 95% CI 0.99-1.02; P =0.30). Within individual hospitals, a RRT was associated with a significantly lower than expected mortality at 4 (7.1%) of hospitals, and significantly higher than expected mortality at 2 (3.6%), when compared to pre-implementation trends. Conclusion: Among a diverse sample of U.S. hospitals, we found that the implementation of a RRT was not associated with a significant reduction in hospital mortality. Given their prevalence in most U.S. hospitals, further studies are needed to understand best practices in composition, design, and implementation of RRTs.