Newswise — Heart disease, pneumonia, consistently the most common reasons for hospitalizing the elderly.
Cardiac-related conditions such as congestive heart failure, hardening of the arteries, heart beat irregularities, and heart attack accounted for four of the five most common principal diagnoses for hospitalizing elderly patients in 2004, according to a new report by HHS' Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.
"¢ Collectively, these five conditions accounted for nearly 2.4 million hospital stays. "¢ Pneumonia was the second-leading condition with 713,000 admissions. "¢ The next five leading reasons for hospitalizing the elderly included osteoarthritis, stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, rehabilitation care and fluid and electrolyte disorders, such as abnormally high sodium levels in the blood. "¢ The leading causes of hospitalization of the elderly have remained largely consistent since 1997, according to AHRQ's report. "¢ But what it costs hospitals to treat elderly patients has not remained consistent. The average hospital stay for elderly patients cost hospitals $9,800 in 2004 " a more than 25 percent increase over the $7,800 average cost in 1997.
These statistics are from the Nationwide Inpatient Sample, a database of hospital inpatient stays that is nationally representative of all short-term, non-federal hospitals. The data are drawn from hospitals that comprise 90 percent of all discharges in the United States and include all patients, regardless of insurance type as well as the uninsured. For more data, see Trends in Elderly Hospitalizations, 1997 " 2004, HCUP Statistical Brief # 14.
To see previous News and Numbers from AHRQ, please go to http://www.ahrq.gov/news/newsnumix.htm.
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