Are publicly insured children less likely to be admitted to hospital than the privately insured (and does it matter)?

Factors Associated with Insured Children's Use of Physician Visits, Dentist Visits, Hospital Care, and Prescribed Medications in the United States: An Application of Behavioral Model of Health-Services Use

This study is the first to examine factors in the utilization of physician services, dentist services, hospital care, and prescribed medications focusing exclusively on insured children in the United States. Data describing 48,660 insured children were extracted from the 2021 National Survey of Children's Health. Children in the present sample were covered by private health insurance, public health insurance, or other health insurance. Logistic regression results showed self-reported health to be negatively associated with physician visits, hospital-care use, and prescription use, but teeth condition to be positively associated with dentist visits. Physician visits were associated negatively with age, Hispanic ethnicity, Asian ethnicity, family income at or below 200% of the federal poverty level, and other health insurance, but positively with parental education and metropolitan residency. Dentist visits were associated positively with girls, age, and parental education, but negatively with Asian ethnicity and public health insurance. Use of hospital care was associated negatively with age and Asian ethnicity, but positively with parental education and public health insurance. Use of prescriptions was associated positively with age, Black ethnicity, parental education, and public health insurance, but negatively with Hispanic ethnicity, Asian ethnicity, and family income at or below 200% of the federal poverty level. Implications included the expansion of public health insurance, promotion of awareness of medicine discount programs, and understanding of racial/ethnic minorities' cultural beliefs in health and treatment.

Ambulatory Care Sensitive Conditions Among All-Payer Claimants With Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities

Inpatient hospitalizations for ambulatory care sensitive conditions (ACSC) among beneficiaries with and without intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) were examined using Medicaid and commercial claims from 2010-2014 in New Hampshire. IDD was defined with International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Edition, Clinical Modification (ICD-9-CM) codes using algorithms from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, and inpatient encounters were identified using the Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set. In adjusted analyses, beneficiaries with IDD had more hospitalizations for ACSC than those without IDD in both insurance groups. Differences in patterns of ACSC prevalence, comorbidities, and hospital admissions between the commercially and Medicaid-insured groups show the value of using all-payer claims data, when possible, to understand health needs and health care utilization of insurance beneficiaries with IDD.

Sunlight and Protection Against Influenza

Recent medical literature suggests that vitamin D supplementation protects against acute respiratory tract infection. Humans exposed to sunlight produce vitamin D directly. This paper investigates how differences in sunlight, as measured over several years across states and during the same calendar week, affect influenza incidence. We find that sunlight strongly protects against getting influenza. This relationship is driven almost entirely by the severe H1N1 epidemic in fall 2009. A 10% increase in relative sunlight decreases the influenza index in September or October by 1.1 points on a 10-point scale. A second, complementary study employs a separate data set to study flu incidence in counties in New York State. The results are strongly in accord.

Examining the relationship between poverty and length of stay: a repeated cross-sectional study of paediatric hospitalisations in Chile

OBJECTIVE

To measure poverty-based disparities in inpatient length of stay for paediatric hospitalisations. In particular, this paper examines the relationship between municipality level poverty rates and length of stay, accounting for individual level characteristics.

DESIGN

We use patient discharge data to conduct a repeated cross-sectional study of the totality of paediatric hospitalisations in 15 regions of Chile, in the years 2011, 2013, 2015 and 2017.

SETTING

All hospital discharges in 15 regions of Chile.

PARTICIPANTS

1 033 222 discharges for children under the age of 15, between 2011 and 2017.

OUTCOME MEASURES

Length of stay (LOS); LOS by type of insurance and type of hospital; hospitalisation rates; municipality-level average LOS.

RESULTS

We find that municipality level poverty rates are a significant predictor of LOS, even after controlling for individual and area level characteristics, including type of insurance. Children from municipalities in the poorest quintile have a LOS that is 14% shorter as compared with children from municipalities in the richest quintile. This relationship is stronger for publicly insured children: the decrease in LOS associated with the same poverty change is of 22%.

CONCLUSIONS

This paper shows that there is an association between municipality-level poverty rates and length of stay for paediatric hospitalisations in Chile. For the vast majority of the sample, and after controlling for individual level characteristics, an increase in the municipality level poverty rate is associated with a decrease in the length of stay. Further, there is a non-linearity in the relationship, where at the highest poverty rates, poverty and LOS are positively associated. These findings are robust after controlling for type of hospital (public vs private), type of insurance (public vs private), type of diagnosis, as well as year and region fixed effects.

Urology Consultation and Emergency Department Revisits for Children with Urinary Stone Disease

PURPOSE

We determined the association between urology consultation and emergency department revisits for children with urinary stones.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

This retrospective cohort study included patients 18 years old or younger who presented to an emergency department in South Carolina with a urinary stone from 1997 to 2015. The primary exposure was urology consultation during the index emergency department visit. The primary outcome was a stone related emergency department revisit occurring within 180 days of discharge from an index emergency department visit. Secondary outcomes included computerized tomography use, inpatient admission and emergent surgery.

RESULTS

Of 5,642 index emergency department visits for acute urinary stones 11% resulted in at least 1 stone related emergency department revisit within 180 days. Of revisits 59% occurred within 30 days of discharge and 39% were due to pain. The odds of emergency department revisit were highest within the first 48 hours of discharge home (OR 22.6, 95% CI 18.0 to 28.5) and rapidly decreased thereafter. Urology consultation was associated with a 37% lower adjusted odds of emergency department revisit (OR 0.63, 95% CI 0.44 to 0.90) and 68% lower odds of computerized tomography use across all emergency department visits (OR 0.32, 95% CI 0.15 to 0.69). Among patients who revisited the emergency department the frequency of pain complaints was 27% in those with a urological consultation at the index visit and 39% in those without.

CONCLUSIONS

Urology consultation was associated with decreased emergency department revisits and computerized tomography use in pediatric patients with urinary stones. Future studies should identify patients who benefit most from urology consultation and ascertain processes of care that decrease emergency department revisits among high risk patients.