MONDAY, July 10, 2023 (HealthDay News) — The characteristics of injury differ for people experiencing homelessness (PEH), and they have increased odds of hospital admission, according to a study published online June 29 in JAMA Network Open.

Casey M. Silver, M.D., from the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, and colleagues conducted a retrospective observational cohort study involving participants in the 2017 to 2018 American College of Surgeons Trauma Quality Improvement Program to examine whether differences in mechanisms of injury exist between PEH and housed trauma patients.

Data were included for 1,738,992 patients who presented to 790 hospitals with trauma, of whom 0.7 and 99.3 percent were PEH and housed patients, respectively. The researchers found that PEH were younger than housed patients (mean age, 45.2 versus 53.7 years) and were more often male (84.3 versus 58.9 percent), and they had higher rates of behavioral comorbidity (23.5 versus 11.1 percent). Different injury patterns were sustained by PEH compared with housed patients, including higher proportions of injuries due to assault (36.0 versus 9.6 percent), injuries due to pedestrian strike (15.4 versus 3.2 percent), and head injuries (65.6 versus 49.3 percent). Compared with housed patients, PEH experienced increased adjusted odds of hospitalization on multivariable analysis (adjusted odds ratio, 1.33). On subgroup comparison of PEH with low-income housed patients, the association with hospital admission persisted (adjusted odds ratio, 1.10).

“These findings underscore potential opportunities for policy and social programming initiatives to improve the care and hospital use of injured PEH,” the authors write.

One author disclosed ties to Amae Health.

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