CHIA Releases Report on Behavioral Health and Readmissions in Massachusetts Acute Care Hospitals

DATE: October 13, 2022

CHIA today released its most recent report on Behavioral Health and Readmissions in Massachusetts Acute Care Hospitals in SFY 2020. Increasingly, efforts to reduce readmissions have focused on developing strategies to better manage patients’ medical or surgical conditions. Evidence suggests, however, that patients with comorbid behavioral health conditions have higher readmission rates, have higher overall hospital utilization, and incur higher health costs.

This report finds that a high prevalence of behavioral health comorbidities among the hospitalized adult population in Massachusetts was associated with a majority of unplanned readmissions throughout the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Key Findings:

• Almost half (46%) of adults hospitalized in Massachusetts acute care hospitals had at least one comorbid behavioral health condition, representing a majority of discharges (54%) in SFY 2020.
  
  
• Patients with any behavioral health comorbidity had inpatient stays that were, on average, 1.4 days longer than patients with no behavioral health comorbidity (6.0 days vs. 4.6 days).
  
  
• Readmission rates for patients with any behavioral health comorbidity were nearly double the readmission rates for patients without any comorbid behavioral health condition (20.6% vs. 10.6%).
  
  
• From April to June 2020, among discharges with a COVID-19 diagnosis, the presence of a comorbid behavioral health condition was associated with a readmission rate 2.2 times higher than discharges without a behavioral health condition (21.2% vs. 9.6%).

This report is also accompanied by a detailed databook and technical appendix.

For additional analysis and coverage of hospital readmissions and revisits in Massachusetts, please visit https://www.chiamass.gov/hospital-wide-adult-all-payer-readmissions-and-revisits-in-massachusetts/.