Demonstrating the Usefulness of the National Hospital Care Survey to Track Patients Who Used Outpatient Department and Other Hospital Services Over Time

• Activity Number: 253 - SPEED: Government Statistics, Health Policy, and Marketing
• Type: Contributed
• Date/Time: Monday, July 31, 2017 : 3:05 PM to 3:50 PM
• Sponsor: Government Statistics Section
• Author(s): Geoffrey Jackson* and Margaret Hall and Alexander Schwartzman
• Companies: National Center for Health Statistics, CDC and National Center for Health Statistics, CDC and National Center for Health Statistics, CDC
• Keywords: Hospital outpatient department patients ; utilization ; National Hospital Care Survey ; tracking patients' hospital care over time

Abstract

Inpatient hospital care has been declining, while hospital outpatient department (OPD) services have been increasing, in recent years. This presentation will demonstrate the potential of the National Hospital Care Survey (NHCS), conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics, to provide detailed, previously unavailable information about OPD services, and the other hospital care outpatient patients receive, e.g. in the emergency department, intensive care unit, and inpatient units, before and after their OPD care. While not yet nationally representative, 2014 NHCS data has information from over 19 million OPD visits, 4.5 million emergency department visits and 1.7 million inpatient stays. The data are from 86 hospitals. Two-thirds of the OPD visits were by patients aged 45 and over, and 60% were by females. The average number of diagnoses per OPD visit was 2, and the average number of visits to the OPD per person during 2014 was 3.6 Over 25% of the patients' all-listed diagnoses were mental disorders, diseases of the circulatory system, or diseases of the musculoskeletal system and connective tissue.