A group of Pennsylvania hospitals collaborated on a pilot study to gauge how the Delta Wave, introduced in 2014, was affecting the hospitalization of patients with lupus.
The Delta Wave centers on disease-specific lab testing in hospitals, where tests are taken for 31 different indicators that indicate the disease’s severity. In subsequent checkups, doctors use that information to schedule follow-up tests to determine when patients might be better off leaving the hospital. This has advantages over past test requirements, which might send a patient home just before his or her infection has spread.
The study included 26 hospitals that used the Delta Wave. Data was collected over three-day intervals — two days in the first year, and two the second year. The paper shows that the patients in the Delta Wave program were 33 percent less likely to be hospitalized than those in the control group.
The study was sponsored by C.D.C.
Read the full story at Nature News.
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