Abstract
In recent years there are in particular in the daily press discussions on the publication of data concerning the number of deaths in different hospitals. Without comments on the structure of the group of hospitalized patients and their morbidity these data may be confounding.
The objective of the work is to inform on the number of deaths and spectrum of the deceased at the Orthopaedic-Traumatological Department in course of three years and analyze the data. The investigated group was formed by patients who died in the course of hospitalization at the Orthopaedic-Traumatological Clinic of the Third Medical Faculty Charles University and Vinohrady Faculty Hospital Prague in 1998-2000.
In 1998 16 men and 15 women died (mean age 85 years), in 1990 29 women and 10 men (mean age 81 years) and in 2000 14 women and 6 men (mean age 78 years). Patients after injuries predominated, only 5 patients died after a planned orthopaedic operation during this period.
The most frequent diagnosis of the deceased patients was fracture of the proximal femur which in 1998 and 1999 accounted for more than 90% and in 2000 for 100% of the patients who died after an injury. According to post-mortem diagnoses death caused by acute myocardial infarction and other complications of ischaemic heart disease predominated (55%).