PolicyLab

In a recent study published in Pediatrics, PolicyLab's Sophie Jan found that children's hospitals are outperforming general hospitals for treatment of adolescent and young adult patients with sickle cell disease.  They believe this is occurring for a few different reasons.  The patients presenting to children's hospitals are probably being cared for by doctors who have known them their entire lives, and therefore are more familiar with the medical histories and potential complications of individual patients. More importantly, they probably still have access to comprehensive and coordinated sickle cell care outside of the hospital.  Comprehensive sickle cell disease centers only exist primarily in pediatrics, and don't exist in the adult world yet.  So those patients presenting to general hospitals don't have access to adequate or coordinated outpatient care, and may actually be sicker when they are finally admitted to general hospitals.  Read more about the research here.