How to define Inpatients housed on Inpatient units as opposed to ambulatory patients (ED, Obs, Clinic, etc)

[pankaj-vyas]

I'm trying to conduct a study on inpatients but do not see any way of identifying patients that are being admitted to an inpatient location. I have looked in the Admission file and do not see this information. I also see on the discussions that Matthew is seeking something similar "Defining Inpatient Admissions #1778" Please could someone advise if his method would work or if there is a better way to identifying inpatients.

Mathew's request:
Given the hosp.admissions table contains ED visits without admission to an inpatient unit, what is the best way to determine an inpatient admission, regardless of the patient journey starting in the ED or otherwise?

--SQL demonstrates ED visits without a transfer to an inpatient unit
select count(*)
from hosp.admissions a
where a.admission_location = 'EMERGENCY ROOM'
-- transfer to a non-ED unit does not exist
and not exists (select 1 from hosp.transfers t where a.hadm_id = t.hadm_id and careunit not in ('Emergency Department Observation', 'Emergency Department'))

Should I simply do the below? It defines inpatient admission as having a transfer to a non-ED unit. I assume a patient that only stays in one unit still has a row in hosp.transfers.

select count(*)
from hosp.admissions a
-- transfer exists to a non-ED unit
where exists (select 1 from hosp.transfers t where a.hadm_id = t.hadm_id and careunit not in ('Emergency Department Observation', 'Emergency Department'))

Thank you!

Matthew

[Bright381]

Inpatients have an hadm_id.

Patients that are not admitted to the hospital (for instance patients coming for biological analysis etc) don't.