Why Women Are Admitted to the Hospital

Why Women Are Admitted to the Hospital
AHRQ News and Numbers
Release date: March 25, 2010

Women accounted for nearly 60 percent of the 39.4 million admissions to U.S. hospitals in 2007, according to the latest News and Numbers from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ).

According to the analysis by the Federal agency, the leading reasons that women are admitted to the hospital are for pregnancy and childbirth. About 5 million of the 23.2 million hospital admissions for women were related to delivery.

Nearly 2 million hospital stays for women involved cardiovascular disease—the number one killer of women. They included treatment of coronary artery disease, congestive heart failure, heart attacks, atrial fibrillation and other types of irregular heart beat, and chest pain with no determined cause.

Other leading reasons why women were hospitalized in 2007 included:

º Pneumonia—608,000 admissions.
º Osteoarthritis—498,000 admissions.
º Depression and bipolar disorder—442,000 admissions.
º Urinary tract infection—383,000 admissions.
º Blood infection (septicemia)—354,000 admissions.
º Skin infections—282,000 admissions.

This AHRQ News and Numbers summary is based on Exhibit 2.3 in HCUP Facts and Figures 2007, which provides highlights of the latest data from the 2007 Nationwide Inpatient Sample, a part of AHRQ's Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project (HCUP).
[http://www.hcup-us.ahrq.gov/reports/factsandfigures/2007/TOC_2007.jsp]

For other information, or to speak with an AHRQ data expert, please contact Bob Isquith at Bob.Isquith@ahrq.hhs.gov or call (301) 427-1539.

Current as of March 2010


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Internet Citation:

Why Women Are Admitted to the Hospital. AHRQ News and Numbers, March 25, 2010. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, Rockville, MD. http://www.ahrq.gov/news/nn/nn032510.htm

http://www.ahrq.gov/news/nn/nn032510.htm