Thomann, Silvia
Hahn, Sabine
Bauer, Silvia
Richter, Dirk
Zwakhalen, Sandra
Article History
Received: 13 January 2021
Accepted: 7 April 2021
First Online: 20 April 2021
Declarations
:
: As the study was conducted in two countries, there is one ethical approval per country. In Switzerland, the Ethics Committee of the Canton of Bern declared that the present study is not subject to the Swiss Human Research Act and ethical approval was not required (April 2019, BASEC-Nr: Req-2019-00259). In Austria, the Ethics Committee of the Medical University of Graz approved the study protocol (approval nr. 20–192 ex08/09). All patients or their legal representatives received written information about the measurement and gave their verbal (Switzerland) or written (Austria) informed consent. In Switzerland, only verbal and no written consent was required, since in 2012 Swissethics and the cantonal ethics committees classified the annual LPZ data collection as a quality measurement for which no written consent of the patients is required. The decisive factors were the aim of the data collection (ensuring and further developing the quality of care), the data collection method, the type of data collected (only data of the regular care process) and the fact that no intervention is carried out. The documentation of the verbal consent was in the responsibility of the participating hospitals. It was recommended that consent be recorded in the patient documentation or centrally for all patients in a separate document. Data were collected pseudonymously so that no conclusions can be made regarding the individual patients. Participation was voluntary. The whole study was performed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki.
: Not applicable.
: The authors declare that they have no competing interests.