Source Files

Beginning in data year 2014, the South Carolina Budget and Control Board has provided their complete outpatient data, in a single file, to HCUP. Emergency department (ED) records are defined by the presence of revenue codes 045X.

Prior to data year 2014, the South Carolina Budget and Control Board provided ambulatory surgery (AS) and ED records to HCUP in three separate files. One file contained information from hospital-owned ambulatory facilities. The second file contains ambulatory surgery data from nonhospital-owned facilities. The third file contains ED visits to hospital-owned EDs, excluding records that have total charges less than $50.

Records for patients treated in the ED, and then treated and released from observation care are also included in the ED data.

Beginning October 1, 2015, South Carolina no longer removes from the data any diagnosis codes indicating medical misadventures and adverse reactions. From 2003 through September 30, 2015, these diagnosis codes were removed from the data files.

Selection of Records for Inclusion in the SEDD

South Carolina provides HCUP with one outpatient file in which ED records are included with records for other nonemergent outpatient services. All records identified by South Carolina as ED are included in the SEDD (HCUP data element STATE_ED=1 based on revenue codes 045X).

Additionally, any other records with evidence of ED services that are flagged by the variable HCUP_ED (i.e., HCUP_ED>0) during HCUP processing are included in the SEDD. If a record in the SASD also has evidence of ED services based on the HCUP criteria (HCUP data element HCUP_ED not equal to 0), then the SASD record is also included in the SEDD. These records will have the same value for the HCUP data element KEY.

Types of Facilities Included in the Files Provided to HCUP by the Partner

South Carolina collects emergency department data from all hospital-owned EDs in the State.

A comparison of the number of hospitals included in the SEDD and the number of hospitals reported in the AHA Annual Survey is available starting in data year 2010.

Hospital-owned EDs do not always report data for a full calendar year. Some open or close during the year; others have technical problems that prevent them from reporting data for all months in a year.

Exclusion of Records

Beginning with 2016 data, records with a discharge disposition of "still a patient" are retained in the HCUP SEDD. Prior to 2016 data, these records were excluded. Beginning in 2010, records with a designation of "admitted as an inpatient" are retained in the SEDD, even though this rarely occurs. Prior to 2010, records with a designation of "admitted as an inpatient" were excluded from the files.