ArticleBMJ open2022
Are cause of death data for Shanghai fit for purpose? A retrospective study of medical records.
Article in BMJ open, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed, 7 citations in OpenAlex.
- Temporal variation in the association between heatwave and mortality from mental disorders: population-based evidence from a megacity of China.Journal of global health · 2025Article
- Assessing the policy utility of routine mortality statistics: a global classification of countries.Bulletin of the World Health Organization · 2023Article
- Assessing the Diagnostic Accuracy of Physicians for Home Death Certification in Shanghai: Application of SmartVA.Frontiers in public health · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
21 authors at 6 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesTo assess the quality of cause of death reporting in Shanghai for both hospital and home deaths. DESIGN AND
settingMedical records review (MRR) to independently establish a reference data set against which to compare original and adjusted diagnoses from a sample of three tertiary hospitals, one secondary level hospital and nine community health centres in Shanghai.
participants1757 medical records (61% males, 39% females) of deaths that occurred in these sample sites in 2017 were reviewed using established diagnostic standards.
interventionsNone. PRIMARY OUTCOME: Original underlying cause of death (UCOD) from medical facilities. SECONDARY OUTCOME: Routine UCOD assigned from the Shanghai Civil Registration and Vital Statistics (CRVS) system and MRR UCODs from MRR.
resultsThe original UCODs as assigned by doctors in the study facilities were of relatively low quality, reduced to 31% of deaths assigned to garbage codes, reduced to 2.3% following data quality and follow back procedures routinely applied by the Shanghai CRVS system. The original UCOD had lower chance-corrected concordance and cause-specific mortality fraction accuracy of 0.57 (0.44, 0.70) and 0.66, respectively, compared with 0.75 (0.66, 0.85) and 0.96, respectively, after routine data checking procedures had been applied.
conclusionsTraining in correct death certification for clinical doctors, especially tertiary hospital doctors, is essential to improve UCOD quality in Shanghai. A routine quality control system should be established to actively track diagnostic performance and provide feedback to individual doctors or facilities as needed.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.