Profiling Bispebjerg Acute Cohort: Database Formation, Acute Contact Characteristics of a Metropolitan Hospital, and Comparisons to Urban and Rural Hospitals in Denmark

Rasmus Gregersen*, Cathrine Fox Maule, Henriette Husum Bak-Jensen, Allan Linneberg, Olav Wendelboe Nielsen, Simon Francis Thomsen, Christian S. Meyhoff, Kim Dalhoff, Michael Krogsgaard, Henrik Palm, Hanne Christensen, Celeste Porsbjerg, Kristian Antonsen, Jørgen Rungby, Steen B. Haugaard, Janne Petersen, Finn E. Nielsen

*Corresponding author for this work

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Abstract

Purpose: To present a metropolitan cohort, Bispebjerg acute cohort (BAC), and compare patient characteristics and outcomes with patients from urban and rural hospitals in Denmark. Patients and Methods: We linked data from seven Danish nationwide registries and included all acute contacts to non-psychiatric hospitals in the years 2016–2018. Acute hospital contacts to Bispebjerg and Frederiksberg Hospital constituted BAC, representing a solely metropolitan/urban catchment area. Patient characteristics and outcomes were compared to the rest of Denmark in an urban cohort (UrC) and a rural cohort (RuC), stratified by visit and hospitalization contact types. Results: We identified 4,063,420 acute hospital contacts in Denmark and BAC constituted 8.4% (n=343,200) of them. BAC had a higher proportion of visits (65.1%) compared with UrC (52.1%) and RuC (45.3%). Patients in BAC more often lived alone (visits: BAC: 34.8%, UrC: 30.6%, RuC: 29.2%; hospitalizations: BAC: 50.8%, UrC: 36.7%, RuC: 37.2%) and had temporary CPR number (visits: BAC: 4.4%, UrC: 1.9%, RuC: 1.6%; hospitalizations: BAC: 1.5%, UrC: 0.9%, RuC: 0.8%). Visit patients in BAC were younger (BAC: 36, UrC: 42, RuC: 45 years, median), more often students (BAC: 18.0%, UrC: 14.0%, RuC: 12.5%), and had more contacts due to infectious diseases (BAC: 19.8%, UrC: 14.1%, RuC: 6.2%) but less due to injuries (BAC: 40.0%, UrC: 43.8%, RuC: 60.7%). Hospitalized patients in BAC had higher median age (BAC: 64, UrC: 61, RuC: 64 years) and fewer were in employment than in UrC (BAC: 26.1%, UrC: 32.1%, RuC: 28.1%). BAC Hospitalizations had a lower death rate within 30 days than in RuC (BAC: 3.0% [2.9–3.1%], UrC: 3.1% [3.0–3.1%], RuC: 3.4% [3.3–3.4%]), but a higher readmission-rate (BAC: 20.5% [20.3–20.8%], UrC: 17.3% [17.2–17.4%], RuC: 17.5% [17.5–17.6%]). Conclusion: Significant differences between BAC, urban, and rural cohorts may be explained by differences in healthcare structure and sociodemographics of the catchment areas.

Original languageEnglish
JournalClinical Epidemiology
Volume14
Pages (from-to)409-424
Number of pages16
ISSN1179-1349
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2022

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Gregersen et al.

Keywords

  • acute care
  • Danish national registers
  • emergency medicine
  • epidemiology
  • registry-based research
  • urban-rural disparities

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