Emergency Department Use Within 30 Days Of Hospital Discharge Common

Between 2008 and 2009, 17.9% of hospitalizations resulted in at least one acute care encounter within 30 days following discharge, and emergency department visits accounted for 40% of post-discharge, hospital-based acute care use. For every 1,000 discharges, there were 97.5 emergency department visits that resulted in re-release, and 147.6 hospital readmissions in the 30 days following the initial discharge. Emergency department “treat-and-release” visits were as low as 22.4 encounters per 1,000 discharges for breast malignancy, to a high of 282.5 for uncomplicated benign prostatic hypertrophy. The findings were . . .