Alberta LGA Age-Standardized Hospital Separation Rates for Selected Conditions, 2003–2010

132 Local Geographic Areas in Alberta provide age-standardized inpatient separation rates per 100,000 population for seven selected conditions from 2003 to 2010. This dataset, part of a 2013 Alberta Health Community Profiles report, standardizes rates across age groups to enable comparisons between different geographic areas and time periods.

Use Cases

• Compare age-standardized separation rates for conditions like Asthma or Diabetes across the 132 Local Geographic Areas to identify regional health disparities.
• Analyze temporal trends in Ischemic Heart Diseases or Influenza separation rates from 2003 to 2010 at both LGA and provincial Alberta levels.
• Model the relationship between population age structure and standardized rates for Mental and Behavioural Disorders due to Psychoactive Substance Use or Pneumonia.
• Benchmark Pulmonary Heart and Pulmonary Circulation Diseases separation rates in specific LGAs (e.g., Lacombe, Red Deer) against the Alberta-wide average.

Strengths

• Covers 132 distinct Local Geographic Areas within Alberta for granular spatial analysis.
• Includes seven clinically significant condition categories, enabling multi-disease comparison.
• Uses age-standardized rates per 100,000 population, a technique designed for accurate comparison across groups with different age distributions.
• Provides eight years of temporal coverage from 2003 to 2010.

Limitations

• Data is temporally stale, with the latest year being 2010 and the report published in 2013.
• The specific count of data rows (observations per LGA-condition-year) is unknown, limiting assessment of dataset scale.
• Limited to inpatient separations in Alberta, Canada, not representative of other provinces or outpatient care.

Provenance

Source

Government of Alberta, published as part of the 'Alberta Health Primary Health Care - Community Profiles' report.

Collection Method

Derived from hospital abstracts for inpatient care collected at the time of discharge (separation).

Time Range

2003 – 2010

Freshness

null

Geography

Alberta, Canada, specifically 132 Local Geographic Areas (e.g., Lacombe, Red Deer, Calgary West Bow).