Private psychiatric hospital care in Australia: a descriptive analysis of casemix and outcomes

Jeffrey Cl Looi; Tarun Bastiampillai; William Pring; Stephen R Kisely; Stephen Allison

doi:10.1177/10398562211051252

Private psychiatric hospital care in Australia: a descriptive analysis of casemix and outcomes

Australas Psychiatry. 2022 Apr;30(2):174-178. doi: 10.1177/10398562211051252. Epub 2021 Nov 27.

Authors

Jeffrey Cl Looi¹, Tarun Bastiampillai², William Pring³, Stephen R Kisely⁴, Stephen Allison⁵

Affiliations

¹ Academic Unit of Psychiatry and Addiction Medicine, The Australian National University Medical School, Canberra Hospital, Canberra, ACT, Australia; Consortium of Australian-Academic Psychiatrists for Independent Policy and Research Analysis (CAPIPRA), Canberra, ACT, Australia; and Private Psychiatry, Canberra, ACT, Australia.
² Consortium of Australian-Academic Psychiatrists for Independent Policy and Research Analysis (CAPIPRA), Canberra, ACT, Australia; College of Medicine and Public Health, Flinders University, Adelaide, SA, Australia; and Department of Psychiatry, Monash University, Clayton, VIC, Australia.
³ Consortium of Australian-Academic Psychiatrists for Independent Policy and Research Analysis (CAPIPRA), Canberra, ACT, Australia; Monash University, and Centre for Mental Health Education and Research at Delmont Private Hospital, Melbourne, VIC, Australia; and Private Psychiatry, Melbourne, VIC, Australia.
⁴ Consortium of Australian-Academic Psychiatrists for Independent Policy and Research Analysis (CAPIPRA), Canberra, ACT, Australia; School of Medicine, The University of Queensland, Princess Alexandra Hospital, Woolloongabba, Brisbane, QLD, Australia; and Departments of Psychiatry, Community Health and Epidemiology, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
⁵ Consortium of Australian-Academic Psychiatrists for Independent Policy and Research Analysis (CAPIPRA), Canberra, ACT, Australia; and College of Medicine and Public Health, Flinders University, Adelaide, SA, Australia.

PMID: 34839742
DOI: 10.1177/10398562211051252

Abstract

Objective: To provide a rapid clinical update on casemix, average length of stay, and the effectiveness of Australian private psychiatric hospitals.

Methods: We conducted a descriptive analysis of the publicly available patient data from the Australian Private Hospitals Association Private Psychiatric Hospitals Data Reporting and Analysis Service website, from 2015-2016 to 2019-2020. This was compared with corresponding reporting on public and private hospitals from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, and Australian Mental Health Outcomes and Classification Network.

Results: In 2019-2020, there were 72 private psychiatric hospitals in Australia with 3582 acute beds. There were 42,942 inpatients with 1,286,470 days of care, and a mean length of stay 19.6 days (SD 13.9) for the financial year 2019-2020. The main diagnoses were major affective and other mood disorders (49%), and alcohol and other substance abuse disorders (21%). Clinician-rated outcome measures, that is, the HoNOS, showed an improvement effect size of 1.64, while the patient-rated MHQ-14 showed an improvement effect size of 1.18. Results are similar for previous years.

Conclusions: Private psychiatric hospitals provide substantial, effective psychiatric care.

Keywords: Australia; casemix; outcome measures; private psychiatric hospitals; process measures.

MeSH terms

Australia
Diagnosis-Related Groups*
Hospitals, Private
Hospitals, Psychiatric*
Humans
Length of Stay
Mood Disorders