Dive Brief:
- Medicaid heart failure patients typically have longer hospital stays, according to a study published in the Journal of Healthcare Quality.
- To make this determination, University of North Carolina and Ohio State University researchers analyzed data on 1,300 heart failure patients comparing their length of stay to their socioeconomic status.
- Patients with lower socioeconomic status did not have longer lengths of stay, but patients with comorbid illnesses did have longer lengths of stay.
Dive Insight:
According to the researchers, the next important step is to see how data on out-of-hospital management of chronic diseases is impacting length of stay, along with heart failure severity. Regardless, it seems clear something important is keeping Medicaid patients in the hospital for heart failure longer than perhaps they need to be. This is clearly an area for greater study.