Miami-Dade County is #1 in Florida for Highest Medicare Costs & Inpatient Readmission Rate
Get Dexur’s Personalized Hospital Specific Presentation on Quality, Safety, Compliance & Education
By: Jeffrey Maser Nov. 21, 2017
Within a population, hospitalization rates, readmission rates, and average cost per person are all closely related. For a background on hospitalization rates and cost per person, please click here. For purposes of this study, the readmission rate for a population is defined as hospital readmissions divided by total Medicare discharges from the population. When more people are hospitalized, more discharges occur. With more discharges, more people can potentially be readmitted. When more people are admitted and readmitted, more money is paid by Medicare into the total pool. As that total pool of dollars increases, cost per person within the population rises as well. A diagram, which indicates the connections between these three measures can be seen below.
Medicare enrollees within Miami-Dade county, Florida serve as a clear example of these connections. As seen in the table below, Miami-Dade county residents were ranked first in the state for both yearly hospitalization cost per enrollee and inpatient readmission rate while county residents were second in the state for inpatient hospitalization rate, only behind residents of Florida’s Okeechobee County.
| Florida County | Yearly Hospitalization Cost per Enrollee Rank | Yearly Hospitalization Cost per Enrollee ($) | Inpatient Readmission Rate Rank | Inpatient Readmission Rate (%) | Inpatient Hospitalization Rate Rank | Inpatient Hospitalization Rate (%) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Miami-Dade | 1 | 5,186 | 1 | 30.31 | 2 | 43.29 |
| Okeechobee | 2 | 4,598 | 2 | 29.45 | 1 | 48.06 |
| Dixie | 3 | 4,092 | 38 | 23.28 | 3 | 41.8 |
| Baker | 4 | 3,915 | 35 | 23.32 | 10 | 38.13 |
| Union | 5 | 3,883 | 17 | 24.77 | 4 | 41.52 |
| Broward | 6 | 3,877 | 3 | 28.3 | 17 | 36.26 |
| Putnam | 7 | 3,796 | 30 | 24.01 | 13 | 37.57 |
| Columbia | 8 | 3,780 | 12 | 25.43 | 6 | 39.16 |
| Suwannee | 9 | 3,716 | 8 | 26.23 | 9 | 38.21 |
| Duval | 10 | 3,712 | 36 | 23.31 | 7 | 38.41 |
When viewing the Miami-Dade county data on the national level, the data remains significantly higher than average for all three measures. Out of all counties nationwide, Miami-Dade County residents land in the 98th percentile for highest readmission rates, the 97th percentile for highest yearly cost per Medicare enrollee and the 96th percentile for highest hospitalization rates.
To understand these measures in comparison to counties of similar size, Dexur analysts identified all U.S. counties with an enrolled Medicare population of at least 50,000 people. Within this 159 county subset, Miami-Dade county residents had the second highest readmission rate, the fifth highest hospitalization rate and the sixth highest yearly cost per Medicare enrollee. It is important to organize and analyze county data by population size as large, urban environments may have different patterns than less populated, rural areas. When compared to counties of similar size, the differences in the data for Miami-Dade county residents are even more apparent; Miami-Dade County Medicare enrollees pay more per hospitalization, are admitted more, and are readmitted significantly more than the average U.S. county’s Medicare enrollees.
| U.S. County | State | Inpatient Readmission Rate Rank | Inpatient Readmission Rate (%) | Yearly Hospitalization Cost per Enrollee ($) | Total Medicare Payments for All ($) | Inpatient Hospitalization Rate (%) | Medicare Enrollments Fee for Service |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Clark | NV | 1 | 31.73 | 4,015 | 767,788,077 | 29.73 | 191,251 |
| Miami-Dade | FL | 2 | 30.31 | 5,186 | 828,278,006 | 43.29 | 159,729 |
| Lake | IN | 3 | 30.2 | 4,997 | 337,721,049 | 44.41 | 67,583 |
| Harris | TX | 4 | 29.73 | 4,202 | 1,244,239,161 | 32.15 | 296,076 |
| El Paso | TX | 5 | 28.68 | 3,254 | 175,743,390 | 29.77 | 54,002 |
| Hidalgo | TX | 6 | 28.45 | 4,566 | 229,678,629 | 38.07 | 50,301 |
| Tarrant | TX | 7 | 28.37 | 3,962 | 553,547,545 | 34.71 | 139,697 |
| Broward | FL | 8 | 28.3 | 3,877 | 535,811,889 | 36.26 | 138,204 |
| Dallas | TX | 9 | 27.66 | 3,842 | 820,782,603 | 31.58 | 213,608 |
| Collin | TX | 10 | 27.27 | 3,062 | 214,548,551 | 28.04 | 70,063 |
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
