The identifier concept: Clinical parameters to stratify hospital patient costs within gynecology diagnosis-related groups

The purpose of this study was to analyze whether clinical variables could stratify hospital costs within gynecology diagnosis-related groups. We analyzed 3171 gynecologic admissions to a large teaching hospital and found that the parameters of nonemergency and intensive care unit admission and blood or plasma product utilization could stratify hospital costs and outcome within a gynecology diagnosis-related group. Patients with the variables had higher total hospital costs, a longer hospital length of stay, more procedures per patient, a greater proportion of outliers, and a higher mortality than patients without the variables. This study demonstrates that these four clinical variables could be used to focus cost-containment efforts on gynecologic patients incurring higher costs in the coming ear of limited resources.