3.7% Drop In Hospital Readmission Rates Between 2007 & 2015; Drop Attributed to Medicare Readmission Penalties

Between 2007 and 2015 hospital readmission rates for Medicare beneficiaries dropped by 3.7%. The reduction was attributed to Medicare readmission penalties in the Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program.

For the conditions targeted by the program, readmission rates dropped from 21.5% to 17.8%. For non-targeted conditions, readmission rates dropped from 15.3% to 13.1%. During the same period, the use of observation stays for conditions targeted by the program rose at the same rate as for conditions not targeted by the program. For targeted conditions, observation stays increased from 2.6% in 2007 to 4.7% in . . .