Failure to Rescue | Complex Clinical Care

Running head:COMPLEX CLINICAL CARE
Failure to Rescue
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

COMPLEX CLINICAL CARE1
Introduction and Definition
The term’ failure to rescue’ originated to measure the quality of care that is given
post-surgery immediately and it was meant to evaluate the staff’s ability to stabilize a person
after they have deteriorated. It is evident that sometimes in the task of carrying out the
surgery, complications do occur. There is a systematic and progressive way to rescue the
patient and stabilize them. However, sometimes due to one factor or the other, it is not
successful. This essay aims to shed light on the research related to ‘failure of rescue’ of
deteriorating patients in acute healthcare facilities, the impact of it on the patients, families,
and the healthcare staff, as well as the strategies that are utilized to lower the risk of failure to
rescue.
Failure to rescue can be referred to as the failure to stop the clinically significant
deterioration of the patient from a medical complication or disease, which may result in
permanent disability and sometimes even death (Psnet.ahrq.gov., 2020). It is also described
as the proportion of death among patients who suffer from treatable complications after
undergoing surgery. ‘Failure to rescue’ acts as an indicating factor of the quality of patient
care provided in the healthcare facility (Barmparas et al., 2018). Here a higher FTR rate
relates to a lower quality of patient care by the healthcare staff.
Adverse Events directly related to Failure to Rescue in Acute Healthcare
Facilities of Australia
It has been seen that maximum failure to rescue occurs amongst surgical patients in
acute healthcare facilities. In a study conducted in many acute care facilities in Australia, a
significant percentage of the patients who faced FTR-related problems died prior to or during
hospitalization (Ahmad et al., 2017) Several factors are related to the incidence of FTR which
includes quality of hospitals, age of the patients (it was significantly higher in adults aged 70

COMPLEX CLINICAL CARE2
or older) (Hravnak et al., 2017). Adverse events can be described as events that precede the
consequence of failure to rescue. These adverse events usually include trauma or surgical
procedures in acute care facilities (Holena et al., 2017). In Australia, around 15-20% of
patients who undergo surgery are faced with some sort of complications, with approximately
5% to 7% of them not making it up to discharge. It was found that FTR has the highest
incidence amongst the patient safety indicators, which is about 91.13 in 1000 cases.
Several events such as acute myocardial infarction, complex surgeries such as liver
transplant that develop complications, are regarded as adverse events resulting in failure to
rescue if death occurs (Silber et al., 2018). The majority of the adverse events are related to
surgery in an acute healthcare facility, followed by the occurrence of medications
(Schwendimann et al., 2018).
It must be remembered that the disease and the nature of the operation often has a
profound effect on whether the patient can be helped or not. Different procedures have
different failure to rescue rates. For example, Sarcopenic Obesity has a higher risk of failure
to rescue than many other complications (Pecorelli et al., 2018). Pancreatectomy is often the
cause of failure to rescue in older patients (Tamirisa et al., 2016).
These are related to many factors, as well. These include a relationship with nurse and
staff volume in the hospital systems, as well as nursing education. It has been seen that lower
staff volume relates to higher failure to rescue. Some patient factors have also been deemed
responsible such as their age, nature of the adverse event, and others (Hatchimonji et al.,
2019). The nurse-to-patient ratio is extremely important for administering quality care and
rapid response to the patients in case they deteriorate. The teaching status of the hospital and
the availability of advanced technology also plays a role in the occurrence of FTR. So it is
evident that hospital characteristics play a huge role in the rate of failure to rescue (Sheetz,