DC Treatment

The DC Treatment field (discontinuation of treatment or DC TX) should be coded in the Critical Care program only if life-support treatment is terminated. The field is on the "Reg & ADL & Var" tab on the Patient Viewer in CCMDB.mdb.

DC TX & Transfer Ready Date/time

• Do not record a transfer ready date/time if the unit physician discontinues life-support treatment (withdraws therapy) on a patient. Leave it blank. This field is not for recording the date and time when discontinuation of life support process started.

questions re, transfer date and dc tx

Pts who become ACP C and expire in hospital 3 days to one month after comfort care is ordered.

• I would like to know where this type of patients fits in. Example: a patient who has co- morbids and is admitted with pneumonia and does not improve or deteriorates. The decision is made to provide comfort care only (ACP C). This patient lives three days to one month in hospital and then dies. Does this patient need a transfer ready date?

• If a unit physician discontinues life-support treatment and a patient does not die immediately and is placed on a transfer/ready list, and then passes away PRIOR TO being transferred out of the ICU unit, then Transfer ready should not be recorded.

• If a patient arrests in the unit and CPR is unsuccessful, the date and time of stopping CPR should not be recorded for Transfer ready.

Legacy Information

This field was also collected in Medicine until 2013-07-04. Collection stopped because the distinction is not clear enough for coding on a medicine ward. See: Comfort Care article.