This group of measures provides information about lengths of stay for mental health and substance use disorder hospitalizations in Canada stratified by diagnostic, geographic and demographic characteristics.
Counts = Total number of days stayed in hospital involving mental health and substance use disorders
Percentages = (Sum of days stayed for breakdown value ÷ Sum of days stayed across all breakdown values) × 100
Average days stayed in hospital for mental health and substance use disorders = Total days stayed in hospital for mental health and substance use disorders ÷ Total number of hospitalizations for mental health and substance use disorders
0.5% trimmed average days stayed = Average after removing the highest 0.5% and lowest 0.5% of values; this reduces the effect of extreme values on the average
Median days stayed in hospital for mental health and substance use disorders = The middle value of a sorted length of stay from the smallest to the largest
25th percentile of days stayed in hospital for mental health and substance use disorders = 25% of mental health and substance use disorder hospitalizations had a length of stay less than the calculated value
75th percentile of days stayed in hospital for mental health and substance use disorders = 75% of mental health and substance use disorder hospitalizations had a length of stay less than the calculated value
Crude rate = (Number of days stayed for mental health and substance use disorders ÷ Population estimate) × 100,000
Age-standardized rate = Number of days stayed based on the crude rates for each age group and the application of population weights for each age group
Unit of analysis: Days stayed for mental health and substance use disorders
Days stayed (length of stay) may include days stayed that occurred prior to the fiscal year of discharge.
Counts, percentages, means, medians, 25th and 75th percentiles, rates: Total days stayed
Crude rates: Total mid-year population
Total days stayed for discharges in Canada for mental health and substance use disorders as the primary diagnosis and/or diagnosis category
Comments
Length of stay = Discharge Date minus Admission Date
Where Discharge Date = Admission Date, the length of stay (LOS) is set to 1. Service interruptions and alternate level of care (ALC) days are included if they occurred during the stay.
Days stayed is equivalent to LOS.
The basic unit of observation is the discharge abstract or the record of an inpatient’s stay in a psychiatric or general hospital. The discharge abstract is completed at discharge, which includes, for example, cases where the individual was transferred to another hospital or care setting (e.g., long-term care), left against medical advice or died. Records are grouped into fiscal years based on the individual’s date of discharge from the hospital. If an individual was hospitalized more than once in the same fiscal year, a separate record for each stay was submitted. Hence the basic units of observation are events, not unique patients. If an individual was admitted prior to the beginning of a fiscal year, the days stayed prior to the year of discharge are included in the total days stayed for that event.
In Canada, there is no standard definition of a psychiatric hospital. For the purposes of these measures, psychiatric hospitals are medical hospitals that provide psychiatric services on an inpatient and/or outpatient basis and that have been identified by the provinces or CIHI. Also for the purposes of these measures, a general hospital is a publicly funded hospital that provides primarily for the diagnosis and treatment of hospitalized individuals with a wide range of diseases or injuries. The services of a general hospital are not restricted to a specific age group or a specific recorded sex or gender.