Abstract
Collection of audit data about epidural blood patches has traditionally relied on voluntary reporting, which is notoriously incomplete. The records of Medicare-funded Australian private obstetric practice, which represents 30% of all deliveries, allow a novel method of central data collection and retrieval. Data relating to all deliveries, epidurals and blood patches in private practice in Australia over a two-year period were retrieved from the Health Insurance Commission. The overall rate of epidural analgesia in labour was estimated at 30% and the proportion of epidurals that progressed to blood patching was 0.35%. The rate of epidural blood patching varied between states from 0.18% to 0.56%. Despite certain limitations of our data interpretation, we regard this technique as a useful audit tool capable of generating accurate and robust audit data that might otherwise be unobtainable.
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