Cost savings of hip arthroplasty patients on specialized orthopedic surgery units.

We retrospectively compared resource use of 2 groups of patients who underwent total hip arthroplasty between 1996 and 2004: those cared for on specialized orthopedic surgery (SOS) units and those cared for on nonorthopedic nursing (NON) units. Of 5546 patients, 5275 (95.1%) were admitted to SOS units and 271 (4.9%) to NON units. Mean overall adjusted cost saving for SOS patients was $622 (SD, $315; 95% CI, $3, $1241). Mean blood bank and room-and-board costs were lower on SOS units: $110 (SD, $36; 95% CI, $40, $181) and $298 (SD, $118; 95% CI, $66, $530), respectively. Difference in length of stay was not significant: mean, 0.19 day; SD, 0.11 day; 95% CI, -0.02 day, 0.40 day. Our results suggest that SOS units, as one way of optimizing patient flow in the postoperative period, may reduce unnecessary inpatients costs.