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Indwelling urinary catheters frequently are used in hospitalized elderly patients, sometimes for specific medical reasons and sometimes for staff convenience. In this study, researchers sought to determine whether urinary catheterization without medical indication was associated with adverse outcomes. They used prospectively collected data from a previously published clinical trial involving patients aged 70 and older (mean age, about 80) hospitalized in a general medical unit.
Of 535 patients without a specific medical indication for catheterization, 14% received an indwelling urinary catheter within 48 hours of admission. As expected, catheterized patients were sicker than noncatheterized patients, and they were more likely to die in the h…