Unplanned hospital readmission following orthopedic procedures results in significant expenditures for the Medicare population. In order to reduce expenditures, hospital readmission has become an important quality metric for Medicare patients. The purpose of the present study is to determine the incidence and risk factors for 30-day readmissions after hip fracture surgery.

Patients over the age of 18 years who underwent hip fracture surgery, including open reduction internal fixation (ORIF), intramedullary nailing, hemi-arthroplasty, or total hip arthroplasty, between the years 2012 and 2013 were identified from the American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality improvement Program (NSQIP) database. Overall, 17,765 patients were identified. Univariate and multivariate analyses were performed in order to determine patient and surgical factors associated with 30-day readmission.

There were 1503 patients (8.4%) readmitted within 30-days of their index procedure. Of the patients with a reason listed for readmission, 27.4% were for procedurally related reasons, including wound complications (16%), peri-prosthetic fractures (4.5%) and prosthetic dislocations (6%). 72.6% of readmissions were for medical reasons, including sepsis (7%), pneumonia (14%), urinary tract infection (6.3%), myocardial infarction (2.7%), renal failure (2.7%), and stroke (2.3%). In the subsequent multivariate analysis, pre-operative dyspnea, COPD, hypertension, disseminated cancer, a bleeding disorder, pre-operative hematocrit of <36, pre-operative creatinine of >1.2, an ASA class of 3 or 4, and the operative procedure type were each independently associated with readmissions risk (p<0.05 for each).

The overall rate of readmission following hip fracture surgery was moderate. Surgeons should consider discharge optimization in the at risk cohorts identified here, particularly patients with multiple medical comorbidities or an elevated ASA class, and should focus on wound complications and fall risks in order to minimize readmissions. Further, quality-reporting metrics should account for the risk factors identified here, in order to prevent penalties against surgeons who take on complex patients.