The cost of injury: hospital charges for pregnant trauma patients, 1999 to 2003.

BACKGROUND

Traumatic injuries during pregnancy are the leading cause of nonobstetric maternal mortality. We aimed to determine hospital charges for trauma activations during pregnancy.

METHODS

We used the Illinois State Trauma Registry data from 1999 to 2003. Using STATA for bivariate and regression analyses, we compared total hospital costs for women more than 24 weeks pregnant with nonpregnant women.

RESULTS

Six hundred thirty-five pregnant women (2.4% of 26,806 female trauma patients) were admitted during the study period. In multivariate regression, pregnancy was associated with lower hospital charges; however, for any given length of stay, pregnancy increased hospital charges (α = $17,864.80, P = .001). Pregnancy also independently predicted increased length of stay for similar injury severity.

CONCLUSIONS

When controlling for injury severity, pregnancy independently predicted an increased duration of hospitalization and hospital charges. These findings have important implications for resource allocation and care of trauma in pregnancy.