Professor of health care policy Sharon-Lise Normand, PhD, co-authored a study comparing 30-day mortality rates in Medicare patients that suffered from acute myocardial infarction and the safety cultures of the hospitals in which they were treated.

The study, published in the Health Services Research, examined data from 19,357 acute myocardial infarction discharges linked to 257 safety culture surveys taken by staff at 171 hospitals across the United States.

The mean patient age in the studied group was 79 years old, with 52.2% of patients being male. Mortality among these patients within 30 days of their admittance date was averagely 16% across the 257 surveys studied.

Using this data, Normand and her colleagues concluded that “no statistically significant relationships were found between risk-adjusted 30-day mortality and any measure of safety culture”.

Results from these safety culture surveys are used by hospitals to identify areas that need improvement to increase safety, but this study suggests that these resources may be allocated in better ways.