title: Psychiatric and substance abuse disorder diagnoses as predictors of length of hospital stay.
abstract: The mental health and substance abuse components of AN-DRG 3 were examined using data from all inpatient separations in two Australian States over a two-year period. Assignment to a mental health or a substance abuse diagnosis related group (DRG) predicted about 20 per cent of the variability in average length of stay of patients treated for such conditions. Assignment to a substance abuse DRG was a much less robust predictor of length of hospital stay than assignment to a mental health DRG. There was little variation between years or States. Day-only intent patients were excluded, as were long-stay outliers identified using an inter-quartile range trimming process. Psychiatric DRGs are similar to a number of other non-surgically focused diagnosis related groups in their capacity to predict length of hospital stay. They are likely to remain an important component of casemix classification systems.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Applied Research in Mental Health Care, University of Adelaide.
authors.forename: D I
authors.initials: DI
authors.lastname: Ben-Tovim
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Elzinga
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Burgess
mesh_terms: D006302:Health Services Research / Q000379:methods; D006761:Hospitals / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D007902:Length of Stay / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis*; D016311:Outliers, DRG; D013021:South Australia; D019966:Substance-Related Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis*; D014739:Victoria