Citation

Senterre C, Levêque A, Di Pierdomenico L, Dramaix-Wilmet M, Pirson M. Biomed. Res. Int. 2014; 2014: e237486.

Affiliation

Research Center of Health Economics, Hospital's Management and Nursing, School of Public Health, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Route de Lennik 808, CP 592, 1070 Brussels, Belgium.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2014, Hindawi Publishing)

DOI

10.1155/2014/237486

PMID

24877072

PMCID

PMC4022203

Abstract

OBJECTIVEs. Investigating injuries in terms of occurrences and patient and hospital stay characteristics.

METHODS. 17370 stays, with at least one E code, were investigated based on data from 13 Belgian hospitals. Pearson's chi-square and Kruskal-Wallis tests were used to assess the variations between distributions of the investigated factors according to the injury's types.

RESULTS. Major injuries were accidental falls, transport injuries, and self-inflicted injuries. There were more men in the transport injuries group and the accidental falls group was older. For the transport injuries, there were more arrivals with the support of a mobile intensive care unit and/or a paramedic intervention team and a general practitioner was more implicated for the accidental falls. In three-quarters of cases, it was a primary diagnostic related to injury and poisoning which was made. The median length of stay was nearly equal to one week and for accidental falls, this value is three times higher. The median cost, from the social security point of view, for all injuries was equal to €1377 and there was a higher median cost within the falls group.

CONCLUSION. This study based on hospitals data provides important information both on factors associated with and on hospital costs generated by injuries.

Language: en