Hospital
Stays Grow Shorter
Heart Disease Leading Cause of Hospitalization
For Release
Tuesday, April 24, 2001
Contact: NCHS Press Office
(301) 458-4800
CDC Office of Media Relations (404) 639-3286
E-mail: paoquery@cdc.gov
1999 National
Hospital Discharge Survey. Advance Data No. 319. 18 pp. (PHS)
2001-1250. View/download PDF 553 KB
The latest data on
national trends in hospitalization show that the number of hospital
discharges stabilized during the 1990's--after peaking in the early
1980's--but that the average length of a hospital stay continued to decline
over the past decade. According to a report released today by the Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the average length of stay for
hospital inpatients was 5.0 days in 1999, down from 7.3 days in 1980, as
measured by the National Hospital Discharge Survey, conducted by CDC’s
National Center for Health Statistics.
"This annual
survey is an important source of information to monitor the health care
that our citizens receive," said Dr. Jeffrey Koplan, CDC Director.
"Efforts to improve quality and access depend upon timely
information," he said.
The drop in inpatient
hospitalization is attributed primarily to an increase in ambulatory or
same-day surgery, made possible over the past 20 years with new surgical
techniques and less invasive procedures. Treatment advances, including new
drug therapies, have also contributed to fewer and shorter hospital stays
as have as cost-management controls and alternative forms of health care
organization and payment.
In 1980, the rate of
hospitalization was 168 per 1,000 population. That rate dropped nearly 30
percent to 122 per 1,000 population in 1990 and was 116 per 1,000 in 1999.
Between 1990 and 1999, the discharge rate among the 15-44-year-olds
decreased 17 percent and the rate among those 45-64 years was down 14
percent, but this was more than offset by an 11 percent increase for those
65 years and older, to keep the overall rate fairly constant during the
1990's.
Women were hospitalized
at a rate 45 percent higher than for men in 1999 (due in part to
hospitalization for deliveries and other obstetric and gynecological
diagnoses), but men had slightly longer hospital stays. The
hospitalization rate varied widely by region, from 93 per 1,000 in the
West to 133 in the Northeast.
Six diagnostic
categories–heart disease, delivery, pneumonia, cancer, psychoses, and
fractures accounted for more than 13 million of the 32 million
hospitalizations in 1999. Heart disease was the most frequent cause of
hospitalization with 4.5 million discharges. Coronary atherosclerosis–a
type of heart disease–accounted for over 1 million discharges; the
number and rate of coronary atherosclerosis diagnoses more than doubled
during the 1990's. Among those over 65 years of age, the rate more than tripled.
During 1999, over 41
million procedures were performed on hospital inpatients. Almost
three-fourths of the procedures were in four categories: diagnostic and
therapeutic procedures, obstetrical procedures, operations on the
cardiovascular system, and operations on the digestive system. Men had more
cardiovascular procedures (particularly arteriography and
angiocardiography, cardiac catheterization, removal of coronary artery
obstruction and insertion of stents) than women, while women had higher
rates of digestive surgery. About one-fourth of the operations on women
were obstetrical procedures.
The National Hospital
Discharge Survey collects data from a sample of inpatient records acquired
from a national sample of non-Federal, short-stay hospitals, to produce
the only nationally representative data available on this important
segment of health care. For more about the survey visit our Website.
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