HOSPITAL BED USAGE BY PEOPLE WITH HIV DISEASE - EXPERIENCE IN A PROVINCIAL SETTING

In order to describe hospital bed usage by people with HIV disease in a provincial setting, a retrosPective analysis of admissions to hospit al wards in Oxford was undertaken for people admitted to hospital with all HIV-related illnesses or complications of HIV-related treatment. A total of 83 people were identitifed as having been admitted to hospi tal between January 1986 and the end of August 1990. Average length of hospital stay, the number of admissions per observed person-year and the in-patient days per observed person-year decreased. Of the 2,446 d ays spent in hospital, 913 were by people with an AIDS diagnosis; 1,53 3 days were spent by people who did not fulfil the World Health Organi sation/Centers for Disease Control (WHO/CDC) classification for AIDS b ut who were admitted because of their HIV disease. AIDS is an end-poin t of infection with HIV. Pre-AIDS morbidity, a spectrum of illness of increasing severity from minor illness up to the point of WHO/CDC leve l AIDS, is a major determinant of hospital care and has previously bee n underestimated. In order to calculate the best estimates of hospital care needed, HIV disease should be regarded as a single entity and th e artificial barrier dividing HIV illnesses from AIDS should be discar ded.