Journal of hospital medicine : an official publication of the Society of Hospital Medicine
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Review Meta Analysis Comparative Study
Effects of rapid response systems on clinical outcomes: systematic review and meta-analysis.
A rapid response system (RRS) consists of providers who immediately assess and treat unstable hospitalized patients. Examples include medical emergency teams and rapid response teams. Early reports of major improvements in patient outcomes led to widespread utilization of RRSs, despite the negative results of a subsequent cluster-randomized trial. ⋯ Published studies of RRSs have not found consistent improvement in clinical outcomes and have been of poor methodological quality. The positive results of before-after trials likely reflects secular trends and biased outcome ascertainment, as the improved outcomes they reported were of similar magnitude to those of the control group in the RCT. The effectiveness of the RRS concept remains unproven.