This report, "Ambulatory and Inpatient Procedures in the United States, 1996," presents estimates of surgical and nonsurgical procedures performed in the United States. Data are presented by characteristics of patients, region of the country, and procedure categories for ambulatory and inpatient procedures separately and combined. This report combines data collected from the 1996 National Hospital Discharge Survey and the 1996 National Survey of Ambulatory Surgery.

Data Highlights:
In 1996 an estimated 71.9 million surgical and nonsurgical procedures were performed on 39.9 million ambulatory and inpatient discharges combined. The number of ambulatory (20.6 million) and inpatient (19.3 million) discharges did not differ significantly, but hospital inpatients had 28 percent more procedures - 40.4 million compared with 31.5 million for ambulatory patients.
Females had more discharges and procedures than males did. For ambulatory patients and hospital inpatients combined, 59 percent of discharges (23.6 million) and 58 percent of procedures (42.0 million) were for females.
The leading surgical and nonsurgical procedures performed on ambulatory patients and inpatients combined were endoscopy of small intestine, arteriography and angiocardiography, extraction of lens, and endoscopy of large intestine. These four procedures were performed more than 2 million times in 1996.

Keywords: Surgery, ICD-9-CM, National Hospital Discharge Survey, National Survey of Ambulatory Surgery

This page last reviewed June 17, 2002