4A.
I
NPATIENT
D
ISCHARGES FROM
S
HORT
S
TAY
H
OSPITALSBY
F
IRST
-L
ISTED
D
IAGNOSISAND
P
ATIENT
C
HARACTERISTICS
An inpatient discharge occurs when a person who was admitted to a hospital leaves that hospital. A person who has been
hospitalized more than once in a given calendar year will be counted multiple times as a discharge; thus, the numbers in
this report are for discharges, not persons. Federal, military, and Department of Veteran Affairs? hospitals are excluded.
Beginning in 2010, the psychiatric hospitals also are required to report to the Arizona Department of Health Services. All
discharges are for residents of Arizona. Discharges of out-of-state residents are not included in this report. Discharges of
inpatients in this report exclude newborn infants. Diagnostic groupings and code numbers are based on the International
Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision, Clinical Modification (ICD-9-CM).
The change in the Arizona reporting requirements increased the number of diagnoses that are coded for each discharge
from nine to twenty five. In this section, discharges are presented by principal diagnosis, which is the first one listed on the
discharge summary of the medical record. The number of first-listed diagnoses is the same as the number of discharges.
For comparability with the national data*, the discharge rates are presented per 10,000 population. The groupings of ICD-
9-CM
codes
used
to
identify
specific
diagnostic
categories
can
be
accessed
at
*Findings of the National Hospital Discharge Survey are available in bound reports of the National Center for Health Statistics and online at
Arizona Health Status and Vital Statistics 2013
229
