The average age for hospitalisation was 57 for men and 55 for women.

The general state of health of the population, measured by means of the diseases diagnosed and treated in hospital centres (hospital morbidity), revealed diseases of the circulatory system as the main reason to be admitted to hospital among men and the third in the case of women, after pregnancy, childbirth and puerperium, and diseases of the nervous system and sensory organs, according to Eustat data.

Men accounted for 48.8% and women for 51.2% of the total of 297,100 hospitalisations in acute care hospital in 2007. Furthermore, 42.1% of the people who were admitted to hospital were aged 65 or over.

Graph 1 – Patients discharged per 1000 inhabitants, by sex and age, 2007

Source: EUSTAT

The average age for hospitalisation was 57 for men and 55 for women in 2007. Men accounted for a higher for a higher number of hospital discharges than women per 1,000 inhabitants for all age groups, except in the 20 to 44 age bracket, due to the weight of admissions due to pregnancy, childbirth and puerperium.

The typical degenerative changes of ageing are responsible for the high hospital rates among people over 65. These rates increase the higher the age and the figure for people over 85 years old is 392 hospital discharges per 1000 inhabitants. At the other end of the age scale, the rate among infants under 1 was also high due, particularly, to low birth weight disorders and respiratory diseases: “bronchitis and chronic bronchiolitis”.

Differences according to gender could also be seen in the other most common groups of pathologies: respiratory (particularly "chronic bronchitis") and digestive (“inguinal hernias”) appeared more frequently among men, whereas it was genital-urinary diagnostics for women.

The causes of hospital admissions varied by age. The figures for the different age groups showed that respiratory diseases were the main reason for admissions among the under 14s ("tonsillitis" and "asthma"); then pregnancy complications, childbirth and puerperium among women and fractures and injuries among men (radius, ulna and knee) between the ages of 15 and 44. In the 45-64 age group, digestive disease were the most common for men (“hernia inguinal”) and osteo-myoarticular disorders for women (knee and foot problems). Finally, circulatory diseases appeared as the main cause for hospitalisation among men aged 65 and over ("cardiac insufficiency") and the nervous system and sensory organs in women (with "cataracts" being the principal cause).t

Graph 2.- Patients discharged from acute care hospitals by most common major diagnostic groups and sex, 2007

Source: EUSTAT

The death rate among people admitted to hospital stood at 2.6%. The most common age of death was 78 years old in the case of men and 87 in women. The main causes were tumours (“trachea, bronchial tubes and lung”) among men and circulatory diseases (“cardiac insufficiency”) among women.

The diagnoses that led to the greatest number of readmissions were “maintenance chemotherapy treatment” and chronic conditions, such as "chronic bronchitis" (more common among men) and "cardiac insufficiency" (more frequent in women).

As regards the most frequent hospital surgical operations in 2007, 55.7% were performed on women and 44.3% on men. Women outnumbered men in this area as the result of obstetric surgical procedures during childbirth, which accounted for 21% of the total operations on women.

If pregnancy and childbirth are not included, operations on the musculoskeletal system would be the most common operations among women and men. As far as the other operations were concerned, operations on the digestive and cardiovascular systems were the most frequent among men and on the eye and skin (breast operations) among women.

Graph 1 Patients discharged by major diagnostic groups and sex, 2007

Source: Eustat