Click here to subscribe today or Login.
Of Pennsylvania’s 67 counties, Luzerne County had the ninth-highest rate of hospitalizations for COVID-19 at the outset of the pandemic in Pennsylvania, according to a new report.
The Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council released a new brief Wednesday that “examines COVID-19 hospitalizations for patients of all ages, Pennsylvania residents and non-residents, who were discharged from Pennsylvania’s acute care hospitals from March through June 2020.”
The goal is to establish a baseline for future analysis.
Specifically, the Council looked at the total hospitalizations and the rate per 10,000 residents of each county. On a statewide level, it also looked at the in-hospital mortality rate, average length of stays in days and rate of mechanical ventilation use, breaking down each by age ranges, sex, race and ethnicity and patient income levels.
The date range shows data from when the virus first showed up in Pennsylvania through the peak infection levels in April to the substantial drop of infections as the weather warmed through June. Luzerne County’s infection rates peaked mid-April and hit what remains a county low in June. But the data is a bit outdated as the second surge that hit in the fall more than doubled the number of daily cases of COVID-19 before trending downward in recent weeks.
According to the brief, Luzerne County had 518 cases in the period studied, giving it a rate of of 16.3 cases per 10,000 residents. While that was higher than the state hospitalization rate of 14.5, two neighboring counties were worse. Lackawanna County had a rate of 17.9 and Monroe County — an early hot spot in the state — had a rate of 19.2.
Some state-level data from the brief:
• Patients spent a total of 168,511 days in the hospital, with an average length of stay of 8.8 days; 17.4% of the patients stayed 14 days or longer.
• 15.7% of the patients required mechanical ventilation, and 16.3% of the patients died during their hospitalization.
• Over half (52.6%) of COVID-19 hospitalizations were for patients 65 years and older, 14.9%were under age 45, and 32.5% were 45-64 years.
• Hospitalization rates were higher for older residents, especially ages 55 and older; males; Hispanic residents and Black, non-Hispanic residents; and residents living in high poverty areas (where 25% or more of the population lives in poverty).
• In-hospital mortality rates were higher for older patients, especially ages 65 and older; males; White, non-Hispanic patients; and patients living in low poverty areas (where less than 10% of the population lives in poverty).
• The average length of stay was longer for patients age 55-74; males; and Black, non-Hispanic patients.
• Mechanical ventilation rates were higher for patients age 55-74; males; Asian, non-Hispanic patients and Black, non-Hispanic patients.
• The number of COVID-19 hospitalizations during the four months March-June 2020 (19,177) was 49.4% higher than the average annual number of influenza hospital stays from 2017 to 2020 (12,839).
Reach Mark Guydish at 570-991-6112 or on Twitter @TLMarkGuydish