Death rates in Puerto Rican hospitals higher than in states - USATODAY.com: Patients in Puerto Rico die at statistically higher rates from heart attack, heart failure and pneumonia than those admitted to mainland hospitals, a USA TODAY analysis of new government data shows.
While 11.6% of patients in the states admitted for pneumonia die within 30 days, that number rises to almost 15% in Puerto Rico. Death rates for heart attack also crest above average (18.6% vs. 16.5%) and are slightly higher for heart failure (12.1% vs. 11.2%).
And the rate at which patients were readmitted to Puerto Rican hospitals within a month of discharge also edged up, according to the data. In particular, pneumonia patients landed back in a hospital bed 19.4% of the time, vs. 18.2% in the states.
'The findings highlight the need to focus on the quality of care in Puerto Rico,' says Harlan Krumholz, a Yale cardiologist who helped develop the Medicare analysis released last week of more than 1 million deaths and readmissions in more than 4,600 hospitals from 2005 to 2008.
