AHRQ Releases Hospitalization Report
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality’s Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project (H-CUP) released (pdf) their current Facts and Figures: Statistics on Hospital-Based Care in the United States, 2005.
The report includes information gathered from the H-CUP Nationwide Inpatient Sample. Description of discharge data, collected from 1,000 different facilities across the country, is detailed in the report. It also includes trend analysis considering data from as far back as 1993.
In the period from 1997 to 2005, the number of hospitals operating around the U.S. declined from 5,060 to 4,936. Yet, during that same time period, the number of hospitalizations grew by over 4.5 million admissions. The smaller number of facilities were able to cope with the increase number of inpatients as the average length of hospital stay decreased by 4 percent.
Since 1997, the average cost for a hospital stay has increased at a rate of 5.7 percent annually. The average inpatient stay during 2005 cost $7,900. Following an adjustment to account for the rate of inflation, the average stay cost increase was marked at 5.1 percent each year.
This rate of increase was broken down into disparate components that contributed to these increased costs. The largest percentage of cost related to use of new technology tools increasing the amount of service intensity, which accounted for a 3.5 percent increase in costs. Population increases were responsible for an additional 1.1 percent of the inflation growth.
Collectively, Medicare and Medicaid were the largest payer nationally, contributing 57 percent of payments to healthcare facilities. One out of every five inpatient stays was covered with Medicaid dollars.
The elderly is the largest growing segment of the population in the U.S. In 2005, those 65 and older represented 12 percent of the U.S. However, this age group accounted for almost three times that amount of hospitalizations; 34 percent of inpatient hospitals stays were for persons over age 65 in 2005. Among adults over age 85, the rate of hospitalization was 574 for every 1,000 persons in that same year.
The increase in cost for different conditions varied as well. One of the most expensive conditions to manage in this setting was adult respiratory failure. This condition showed the most significant increase in cost to treat between 2004 and 2005, growing at a rate of twelve times that for other conditions. So, too, did the cost to treat septicemia. The cost to treat that condition grew by twice the rate of other conditions. As well, the rate of hospitalization increased by 30 percent between 1997 and 2005.
Six of the most twenty expensive conditions to treat were cardiovascular diseases, which entailed 17 percent of hospitalizations in 2005. Those six conditions noted to be the most expensive included heart attack, coronary artery disease, irregular heart beat, congestive heart failure, stroke, irregular heart beat, and non-specific chest pain. Between 1997 and 2000, the inflation rate for these conditions rose at a faster rate than others. The inflation rate increases for these cardiac conditions grew the most in 2000 and has since leveled out.
More information on costs for treatment, in addition to demographic factors and disease specific information is noted in the AHRQ report.
August 31, 2007 Related topics: General Management & Administration, Trends