[Why are children hospitalized in Spain?].
OBJECTIVE
Hospital services represent a significant amount of the overall health care devoted to the pediatric population. This work describes regional differences in Spanish pediatric hospital admissions.


METHODS
National, regional, age-specific and diagnostic-specific discharge rates were obtained from the 1987 Hospital Morbidity Survey. To assess regional variations, weighted coefficient of variations (WCV) were obtained.


RESULTS
The overall national discharge rate was 60.45 discharges per 1000 children less than 15 years of age. The weighted coefficient of variation obtained for the sex and age adjusted discharge rates of the 10 more frequent diagnoses was highest for phimosis (56.13) and lowest for appendicitis (19.44).


CONCLUSIONS
Differences in supply and professional practice style have been recognized as causes for the variations in hospital utilization. Hospitalization of patients represents costs and risks. They are justified when scientific evidence shows that their suggested benefits overcome their inconveniences. The existence of this difference leads to suspect that non-clinical factors could be decisive in medical decisions.
Sarría Santamera
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Center for the Evaluative Clinical Sciences, Dartmouth Medical School, Hanover, NH 03755-3863, USA.
D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D006760:Hospitalization / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D013030:Spain