Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

The Multiple Admission Factor (Maf) In Small Area Variation Analysis, Kevin Cain, Paula Diehr

UW Biostatistics Working Paper Series

Small area variation analysis are often based on area-level data such as the total number of hospital admissions within an area, rather than person-level data. Such analysis often make the assumption that the number of admissions within a small area follow a Poisson distribution. This may not be a reasonable assumption when multiple admissions per person are possible. In this case, the multiple admission factor (MAF) can be used to adjust for the extra variance introduced by multiple admissions. In this article, data from Washington State are used to estimate the multiple admission rate and the MAF for each modifed …