Findings from National Institute for Health and Welfare in Health and Medicine Provides New Insights (Regional variation of avoidable hospitalisations in a universal health care system: a register-based cohort study from Finland 1996-2013)

2019 AUG 07 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- New research on Health and Medicine is the subject of a report. According to news reporting from Helsinki, Finland, by NewsRx journalists, research stated, “A persistent finding in research concerning healthcare and hospital use in Western countries has been regional variation in the medical practices. The aim of the current study was to examine trends in the regional variation of avoidable hospitalisations, that is, hospitalisations due to conditions treatable in ambulatory care in Finland in 1996-2013 and the influence of different healthcare levels on them.”

Financial support for this research came from Terveyden Tutkimuksen Toimikunta.

The news correspondents obtained a quote from the research from National Institute for Health and Welfare, “Use of hospital inpatient care in 1996-2013 among the total population in Finland. Altogether 1 931 012 hospital inpatient care episodes among all persons residing in Finland identified from administrative registers in Finland in 1996-2013 and alive in 1 January 1996. We examined hospitalisations due to avoidable causes including vaccine-preventable hospitalisations, hospitalisations due to complications of chronic conditions and acute conditions treatable in ambulatory care. We calculated annual age-adjusted rates per 10 000 person-years. Multilevel models were used for studying time trends in regional variation. There was a steep decline in avoidable hospitalisation rates during the study period. The decline occurred almost exclusively in hospitalisations due to chronic conditions, which diminished by about 60%. The overall correlation between hospital district intercepts and slopes in time was -0.46 (p <0.05) among men and -0.20 (ns) among women. Statistically highly significant diminishing variation was found in hospitalisations due to chronic conditions among both men (-0.90) and women (-0.91). The variation was mainly distributed to the hospital district level. The results suggest that chronic conditions are managed better in primary care in the whole country than before.”

According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “Further research is needed on whether this is the case or whether this has more to do with supply of hospital care.”

For more information on this research see: Regional variation of avoidable hospitalisations in a universal health care system: a register-based cohort study from Finland 1996-2013. Bmj Open, 2019;9(7):e029592. (BMJ Publishing Group - http://group.bmj.com/; Bmj Open - http://bmjopen.bmj.com/)

Our news journalists report that additional information may be obtained by contacting K. Manderbacka, Service System Research, National Institute for Health and Welfare, Helsinki, Finland. Additional authors for this research include M. Arffman, M. Satokangas and I. Keskimaki.

The direct object identifier (DOI) for that additional information is: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2019-029592. This DOI is a link to an online electronic document that is either free or for purchase, and can be your direct source for a journal article and its citation.

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