Medicare Hospital Admissions for U.S. Residents Over Age 65

Hospital admissions data for residents of all 50 states are available for males and females over age 65 from the Health Care Financing Administration. Data are only available on reel tapes, costing $1500 per year, and cover admissions from 1991 to the present. The data must be used for research purposes and returned at the conclusion of a study.

Use Cases

• Analyze admission rates by patient age and gender for geriatric healthcare studies.
• Study temporal trends in hospital admissions from 1991 onward using year and state fields.
• Assess geographic variation in healthcare utilization across all 50 states for Medicare beneficiaries.

Strengths

• Data covers residents from all 50 states, providing national scope.
• Temporal coverage spans from 1991 to the present, enabling longitudinal analysis.

Limitations

• Data is stored only on physical reel tapes, limiting accessibility.
• Contains sensitive patient information requiring a strict usage agreement.
• Data must be returned after research, preventing long-term archiving.

Provenance

Source

Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) Medicare records.

Collection Method

Administrative claims data from the Medicare program.

Time Range

1991 to present

Geography

United States (all 50 states)