Examining Patterns in AIDS-Related Hospitalizations Among African Americans in the United States From 2009-2014

Prianka Legesse-Sinha, The University of Texas School of Public Health

Abstract

The acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) epidemic exerts a substantial clinical burden in the United States. Of all races, African Americans disproportionately account for AIDS-related diagnoses and hospitalizations (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2015a). This study used a descriptive, cross-sectional design by comparing patterns in hospital admissions for African Americans with an AIDS diagnosis among four regions of the United States from 2009-2014: (Northeast, Midwest, West, and South). First, we generated summary statistics for all African Americans living in the four regions and also for African Americans who fit the CDC-defined case definition of AIDS. Second, we summarized the total number of hospital admissions and the number of hospital admissions with an AIDS diagnosis for each region, from 2009-2014. We calculated percentages of hospital admissions with an AIDS diagnosis out of all hospital admissions for African Americans by year and region. Our findings indicated that, in 2009, the Northeast, Midwest, and West regions had 147,726, 130,680, and 70,990 admissions of African Americans, respectively, while the South region had 370,751 admissions. In 2014, the Northeast, Midwest, and West regions had 148,258, 156,442, and 65,855 admissions of African Americans, respectively, while the South region had 416,791 admissions. In 2009, the Northeast, Midwest, and West regions had 10,866, 10,368, and 5,577 admissions of African Americans with an AIDS diagnosis, respectively, while the South region had 33,388 admissions. In 2014, the Northeast, Midwest, and West regions had 11,079, 12,632, and 5,573 admissions of African Americans with an AIDS diagnosis, respectively, while the South region had 37,624 admissions. In 2009, the Northeast, Midwest, and West regions accounted for 18, 17, and 9 percent of hospital admissions with an AIDS diagnosis, respectively, while the South region accounted for 56 percent. In 2014, the Northeast, Midwest, and West regions accounted for 17, 19, and 8 percent of hospital admissions with an AIDS diagnosis, respectively, while the South region accounted for 56 percent. In conclusion, our findings indicated that the number of hospital admissions in this time period was the highest in the South region and the lowest in the West region. Future researchers should perform a formal analysis with statistical tests rather than just a count of hospital admissions to be able to determine statistically significant differences among the U.S. regions and years.

Subject Area

African American Studies|Black studies|Public health|Epidemiology

Recommended Citation

Legesse-Sinha, Prianka, "Examining Patterns in AIDS-Related Hospitalizations Among African Americans in the United States From 2009-2014" (2017). Texas Medical Center Dissertations (via ProQuest). AAI10616957.
https://digitalcommons.library.tmc.edu/dissertations/AAI10616957

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