NCJ Number
190938
Date Published
March 2001
Length
6 pages
Annotation
This report provides a statistical overview of trends and patterns in firearm-related hospital separations in Australia and each of its eight States and Territories for the period 1994-95 to 1998-99.
Abstract
Data analyzed for this report were obtained from the National Hospital Morbidity database held at the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. "Hospital separation" is the term used to refer to an episode of care, which can be a total hospital stay (from admission to discharge, transfer, or death), or a portion of a hospital stay that ends in a change of type of care (e.g., from acute to rehabilitation). For each separation, patients were assigned a principal diagnosis that was defined as the diagnosis chiefly responsible for occasioning the patient's episode of admitted patient care. Persons who attended accident and emergency departments but were not subsequently admitted to the hospital were not included in the National Hospital Morbidity Database. In recent years, there has been a significant decline in firearm-related deaths in Australia, and the current study showed that there had also been a decline in hospital separations as a result of firearm-related injuries. Over the period studied, firearm-related injuries in Australia decreased from 616 to 473, a reduction of 30 percent. The rate of firearm-related hospital separations per 100,000 population decreased from 3.44 to 2.51. There was limited published information available on the number and types of firearms injuries recorded in Australia. The need for such information has become increasingly important, especially since the introduction of firearms regulations that limit access to firearms. 2 tables, 11 figures, and 17 references