Source Files

Beginning in 2008, the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services, Department for Public Health, provides HCUP with an outpatient file that contains emergency department (ED) and observation care records, in addition to outpatient surgical, mammogram, and other procedure records. Information on the record (i.e., revenue codes and/or CPT codes) is used to identify a record as ED, ambulatory surgery, or observation care.

Starting in 2012, ED visits are identified by CPT procedure codes in the range of 99281-99288 or G0380-G0394. Between 2008 and 2011, ED visits were identified by revenue codes in the categories 045x or 068x or an admission type of "emergency" or "trauma", with or without CPT procedure codes in the range of 99281-99288.

Records in the outpatient file are marked by patient type:

• "OS" for outpatient surgery visit
• "OC" observation care visits
• "ED" for emergency department encounters
• "OT" for other outpatient visits
• "MA" for mammographies

Records for patients treated in the ED, and then treated and released from observation care are also included in the ED data.

Selection of Records for Inclusion in the SEDD

Kentucky provides HCUP with one outpatient file in which ED records are included with records for other nonemergent outpatient services. All records identified by Kentucky as ED are included in the SEDD (HCUP data element STATE_ED=1 based on patient type "ED").

Additionally, any other records with evidence of ED services that are flagged by the variable HCUP_ED (i.e., HCUP_ED>0) during HCUP processing are included in the SEDD. If a record in the SASD also has evidence of ED services based on the HCUP criteria (HCUP data element HCUP_ED not equal to 0), then the SASD record is also included in the SEDD. These records will have the same value for the HCUP data element KEY.

SEDD records with evidence of other types of outpatient service, such as outpatient surgery can be identified by the data element OPService.

Types of Facilities Included in the Files Provided to HCUP by the Partner

Kentucky provides HCUP with emergency department (ED) data from all licensed hospital-owned EDs in the State.

A comparison of the number of hospitals included in the SEDD and the number of hospitals reported in the AHA Annual Survey is available starting in data year 2010.

Hospital-owned EDs do not always report data for a full calendar year. Some open or close during the year; others have technical problems that prevent them from reporting data for all months in a year.

Exclusion of Records During HCUP Data Processing

Records with a discharge disposition of "still a patient" are excluded from the HCUP SEDD. Beginning in 2010, records with a designation of "admitted as an inpatient" are retained in the SEDD, even though this rarely occurs. Prior to 2010, records with a designation of "admitted as an inpatient" were excluded from the files.