Ambulatory Pediatrics
Volume 7, Issue 3 , Pages 258-262 , May 2007

Relationship Between Social Inequalities and Ambulatory Care–Sensitive Hospitalizations Persists for up to 9 Years among Children Born in a Major Canadian Urban Center

  • Mohammad M. Agha, MSc, PhD

      Affiliations

    • Centre for Research on Inner City Health, St Michael’s Hospital, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
    • Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
    • Department of Public Health Sciences, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
    • Corresponding Author InformationAddress correspondence to Mohammad Agha, MSc, PhD, Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences, 2075 Bayview Ave, G106, Toronto, Ontario M4N 3M5, Canada.
  • ,
  • Richard H. Glazier, MD, MPH

      Affiliations

    • Centre for Research on Inner City Health, St Michael’s Hospital, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
    • Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
    • Department of Public Health Sciences, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
    • Department of Family and Community Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
    • Department of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
  • ,
  • Astrid Guttmann, MDCM, MSc

      Affiliations

    • Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
    • Department of Pediatrics, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
    • Department of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
    • Division of Pediatric Medicine, The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Received 9 March 2006 ,Accepted 15 February 2007.

References 

  1. Doorslaer EV, Masseria C, Koolman X. Inequalities in access to medical care by income in developed countries. CMAJ. 2006;174:177–183
  2. Parker JD, Schoendorf KC. Variation in hospital discharges for ambulatory care–sensitive conditions among children. Pediatrics. 2000;106(4 suppl):942–948
  3. Steiner JF, Braun PA, Melinkovich P, et al. Primary-care visits and hospitalizations for ambulatory-care–sensitive conditions in an inner-city health care system. Ambul Pediatr. 2003;3:324–328
  4. Garg A, Probst JC, Sease T, Samuels ME. Potentially preventable care: ambulatory care–sensitive pediatric hospitalizations in South Carolina in 1998. South Med J. 2003;96:850–858
  5. Billings J, Anderson GM, Newman LS. Recent findings on preventable hospitalizations. Health Aff (Millwood). 1996;15:239–249
  6. Billings J, Zeitel J, Lukomnik J, Carey TS, Blank AE, Newman L. Impact of socioeconomic status on hospital use in New York City. Health Aff (Millwood). 1993;12:162–173
  7. Weissman JS, Gatsonis C, Epstein AM. Rates of avoidable hospitalization by insurance status in Massachusetts and Maryland. JAMA. 1992;268:2388–2394
  8. Bindman AB, Grumbach K, Osmond D, et al. Preventable hospitalizations and access to health care. JAMA. 1995;274:305–311
  9. Parchman ML, Culler S. Primary care physicians and avoidable hospitalizations. J Fam Pract. 1994;39:123–128
  10. Roos LL, Walld R, Uhanova J, Bond R. Physician visits, hospitalizations, and socioeconomic status: ambulatory care sensitive conditions in a Canadian setting. Health Serv Res. 2005;40:1167–1185
  11. Sin DD, Svenson LW, Cowie RL, Man SF. Can universal access to health care eliminate health inequities between children of poor and non-poor families?. Chest. 2003;124:51–56
  12. Casanova C, Colomer C, Starfield BH. Pediatric hospitalization due to ambulatory care–sensitive conditions in Valencia (Spain). Int J Qual Health Care. 1996;8:51–59
  13. Simpson L, Owens PL, Zodet MW. Health care for children and youth in the United States: annual report on patterns of coverage, utilization, quality, and expenditures by income. Ambul Pediatr. 2005;5:6–44
  14. Todd J, Armon C, Griggs A, Poole S, Berman S. Increased rates of morbidity, mortality, and charges for hospitalized children with public or no health insurance as compared with children with private insurance in Colorado and the United States. Pediatrics. 2006;118:577–585
  15. Sunderland RS, Fleming DM. Continuing decline in acute asthma episodes in the community. Arch Dis Child. 2004;89:282–285
  16. Fleming DM, Cross KW, Sunderland R, Ross AM. Declining incidence of episodes of asthma: a study of trends in new episodes presenting to general practitioners in the period 1989–98. Thorax. 2000;55:657–661
  17. Sullivan SD. Asthma in the United States: recent trends and current status. J Manag Care Pharm. 2003;9(5 suppl):3–7
  18. To T, Guttmann A, Dick P. Inpatient and Day Surgery Use by Children in Ontario: An ICES Atlas Report. Toronto, Ontario: ICES; 2001;
  19. Appendix: a summary of studies on the quality of health care administrative databases in Canada. In:  Goel V,  Williams J,  Anderson G,  Blackstien-Hirsch P,  Fooks C,  Naylor D editor. Patterns of Health Care in Ontario (The ICES Practice Atlas). 2nd ed.. Ottawa: Canadian Medical Association; 1996;p. 341–342
  20. Wilkins R. Automated geographic coding based on the Statistics Canada postal code conversion files, including postal codes to June 2001. In: PCCF+ Version 3G User’s Guide (Geocodes/PCCF). Ottawa, Canada: Health Analysis and Modeling Group, Social and Economic Studies Division, Statistics Canada; 2001;
  21. Sahi H, Khurshid A. Statistics in Epidemiology: Methods, Techniques, and Applications. Boca Raton, Fla: CRC Press; 1996;
  22. Hess J, De Jongste JC. Epidemiological aspects of pediatric asthma. Clin Exp Allergy. 2004;34:680–685
  23. Crighton EJ, Mamdani M, Upshur R. A population based time series analysis of asthma hospitalizations in Ontario, Canada: 1988 to 2000 (BMC). Health Serv Res. 2001;1–7
  24. Braback L, Bjor O, Nordahl G. Early determinants of first hospital admissions for asthma and acute bronchitis among Swedish children. Acta Paediatr. 2003;92:27–33
  25. Ansari Z, Haby MM, Henderson T, Cicuttini F, Ackland MJ. Trends and geographic variations in hospital admissions for asthma in Victoria: opportunities for targeted interventions. Aust Fam Physician. 2003;32:286–288
  26. American Lung Association. Trends in pneumonia and influenza mortality and morbidity (Research and Scientific Affairs, Epidemiology and Statistics Unit). 2004;August. Available at: http://www.lungusa.org. Accessed March 15, 2006
  27. Grant CC, Scragg R, Tan D, Pati A, Aickin R, Yee RL. Hospitalization for pneumonia in children in Auckland, New Zealand. J Paediatr Child Health. 1998;34:355–359
  28. Kreiger N. Overcoming the absence of socioeconomic data in medical records: validation and application of a census-based methodology. Am J Public Health. 1992;82:703–710
  29. Subramanian SV, Chen JT, Rehkopf DH, Waterman PD, Krieger N. Comparing individual and area-based socioeconomic measures for the surveillance of health disparities: a multilevel analysis of Massachusetts births, 1989–1991. Am J Epidemiol. 2006;164:823–834
  30. Roos NP, Mustard CA. Variation in health and health care use by socioeconomic status in Winnipeg, Canada: does the system work well? (Yes and no). Milbank Q. 1997;75:89–111
  31. Alter DA, Naylor CD, Austin P, Tu JV. Effects of socioeconomic status on access to invasive cardiac procedures and on mortality after acute myocardial infarction. N Engl J Med. 1999;341:1359–1367

PII: S1530-1567(07)00034-2

doi: 10.1016/j.ambp.2007.02.005

Ambulatory Pediatrics
Volume 7, Issue 3 , Pages 258-262 , May 2007