20% Of Medicare Beneficiaries Make Another Hospital Visit Within 30 Days Of Hospital Observation
About 20% of Medicare beneficiaries held for a hospital observation stay during 2006 through 2011 returned to the hospital for additional care within 30 days. About half of those making a second hospital visit were admitted for an inpatient stay. About 8.4% returned for emergency department treatment and were later discharged following treatment. About 2.9% were held for a repeat observation stay.
These findings were reported in “Outcomes after observation stays among older adult Medicare beneficiaries in the USA: retrospective cohort study” by Kumar Dharmarajan, Li Qin, Maggie Bierlein, Jennie E. S. Choi, Zhenqiu Lin, Nihar R. Desai . . .
