Reducing medical care expenses is a huge problem in American medical care problems for modern America. Minimizing the expenses of health care is an especially challenging nut to crack. Avoidable re-admissions, or people that have to go back to the medical center soon after leaving one, are an especially difficult dilemma to resolve. Re-admissions are a serious drain on the national medical care system.

Re-admissions could be prevented

Hospitals and health insurers are faced with several issues in the current U.S. health care infrastructure, and one glaring issue is hospital re-admissions. Patients are often discharged. Afterwards, they sometimes need to go back to the hospital. Avoidable re-admissions make up about 4.4 million hospital admissions yearly. That costs about $30 billion in health care expenses, reports the Wall Street Journal. That's about 10 percent of what Americans spend on healthcare. In just Pennsylvania, $1.25 was charged to insurers in 2009 for repeat admissions, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review states.

Medicare and Medicaid losing more

Medicare and Medicaid patients are readmitted to hospitals twice as often as patients with private insurance, and the risk seems to be greater for patients between ages 45 to 64. Medicare patients between 45 and 64 got readmitted twice as often as uninsured patients or patients with private insurance for non-material reasons according to a 2008 study by the Agency for Healthcare Quality and Research. Medicare patients 45 to 64 who weren't going to medical centers for any reason relating pregnancy had a readmission rate of 24.1 percent within 30 days. Similar Medicaid patients had a readmission rate of 24.4 percent. A readmission rate of 11.9 percent was shown for non-pregnancy cases in patients with private insurance who were ages 45 to 64. When it comes to Medicare patients 65 and older compared to private insurance patients that are non-maternal, there are many more Medicare patients. There are twice as many in fact. Any Medicare patients over 65 weren't readmitted too often. There was a 19 percent readmission rate. Much more patients with government-funded medical care have to return to the hospital within 30 days of being discharged.

What causes this

There are a multitude of factors people are readmitted to medical centers. Many recognize medication as a trigger. It plays a huge role. The CDC states that 700,000 emergency room visits and 120,000 hospital admissions occur due to adverse narcotics, which causes about $3.5 billion in medical care spending to occur. This contains painkillers. They are a huge portion of them. Heroin and cocaine deaths combined to make up for the fatalities each year from painkillers. These consist of hydrocodone and oxycodone. There are some patients that just get sent out the door too quickly. Others have illnesses that go undiagnosed. Taking multiple medications increases the risk of an adverse narcotic event. According to the Centers for Disease Control, there are over 82 percent of adults that take medication at least once a day. About 29 percent of adults take over 5 medications every day.

Articles cited

Wall Street Journal

online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304474804576369452547349050.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

pittsburghlive.com/x/valleyindependent/editorial/s_740588.html

Agency for Healthcare Quality and Research

hcup-us.ahrq.gov/reports/statbriefs/sb115.jsp

CDC on Drug reactions

cdc.gov/MedicationSafety/basics.html

CDC on unintentional drug poisoning

cdc.gov/HomeandRecreationalSafety/Poisoning/brief_full_page.htm