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Length of stay in Medicare patients

Hospitalist Leadership Connection, September 27, 2010

In the Medicare population, complicated, nonsurgical patients in community hospitals had the shortest length of stay when hospitalists provided care, according to a new study, “Effect of hospitalists on length of stay in the Medicare population: Variation according to hospital and patient characteristics,” published in the September Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

Researchers at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston examined nearly 2 million Medicare admissions from 2001 to 2006. They found that, with hospitalist care, length of stay changed from 0.02 fewer days in 2001/2002 to 0.35 days in 2005/2006. For 2006 admissions, the greatest length of stay difference occurred in older patients and patients with a higher DRG weight, according to the study.

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