Overview of Hospital Stays in the United States, 2012: Statistical Brief #180

This Statistical Brief presents data from the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project (HCUP) on characteristics of inpatient stays in U.S. community hospitals in 2012. The distribution of type of hospital stay (surgical, medical, and maternal or neonatal) is presented for different characteristics (patient age, primary payer, and hospital region). Changes in hospital utilization and costs from 2003 to 2012 are provided, along with changes in hospital utilization by primary payer and patient age. All differences between mean estimates noted in the text are statistically significant at the 0.0005 level or better. Differences between proportions noted in the text differ by at least 10 percent.