Do Older Rural and Urban Veterans Experience Different Rates of Unplanned Readmission to VA and Non-VA Hospitals?

Autor/inn/en	Weeks, William B.; Lee, Richard E.; Wallace, Amy E.; West, Alan N.; Bagian, James P.
Titel	Do Older Rural and Urban Veterans Experience Different Rates of Unplanned Readmission to VA and Non-VA Hospitals?
Quelle	In: Journal of Rural Health, 25 (2009) 1, S.62-69 (8 Seiten) PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0890-765X
DOI	10.1111/j.1748-0361.2009.00200.x
Schlagwörter	Veterans; Hospitals; Medical Care Evaluation; Risk; Influences; Regression (Statistics); Rural Urban Differences; Health Services; Age Differences + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Kriegsteilnehmer; Veteran; Krankengymnast; Krankenhaus; Risiko; Influence; Einfluss; Einflussfaktor; Regression; Regressionsanalyse; Stadt-Land-Beziehung; Health service; Gesundheitsdienst; Gesundheitswesen; Age; Difference; Age difference; Altersunterschied
Abstract	Context: Unplanned readmission within 30 days of discharge is an indicator of hospital quality. Purpose: We wanted to determine whether older rural veterans who were enrolled in the VA had different rates of unplanned readmission to VA or non-VA hospitals than their urban counterparts. Methods: We used the combined VA/Medicare dataset to examine 3,513,912 hospital admissions for older veterans that occurred in VA or non-VA hospitals between 1997 and 2004. We calculated 30-day readmission rates and odds ratios for rural and urban veterans, and we performed a logistic regression analysis to determine whether living in a rural setting or initially using the VA for hospitalization were independent risk factors for unplanned 30-day readmission, after adjusting for age, sex, length of stay of the index admission, and morbidity. Findings: Overall, rural veterans had slightly higher 30-day readmission rates than their urban counterparts (17.96% vs 17.86%; OR 1.006, 95% CI: 1.0004, 1.013). For both rural- and urban-dwelling veterans, readmission after using a VA hospital was more common than after using a non-VA hospital (20.7% vs 16.8% for rural veterans, 21.2% vs 16.1% for urban veterans). After adjusting for other variables, readmission was more likely for rural veterans and following admission to a VA hospital. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that VA should consider using the unplanned readmission rate as a performance metric, using the non-VA experience of veterans as a performance benchmark, and helping rural veterans select higher performing non-VA hospitals. (As Provided).
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Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2017/4/10