53 National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NHAMCS)
53.3 Description
- Information about the provision and use of ambulatory medical care services in hospital emergency departments, outpatient departments, and ambulatory surgery centers in US
- Data includes patient characteristics (e.g. age, sex, race/ethnicity), visit characteristics (e.g. reason for visit, diagnosis, services ordered and provided, treatments) and physician and practice characteristics
53.6 Collection Methodology
- National sample of visits to emergency departments, outpatient departments, and ambulatory surgery locations in non-institutional, general, and short-stay hospitals in US
- Excludes Federal, military, and Veterans Administration hospitals
- Included only hospital emergency and outpatient departments from 1992-2008, ambulatory survey in hospitals was added in 2009, and ambulatory surgery performed in freestanding ambulatory surgery centers was add in 2010 (but suspended in 2013 to develop a new sampling frame)
- Four-stage probability sampling design used for emergency departments, outpatient departments, and ambulatory surgery locations (geographically defined areas, hospitals, clinics, and patient visits)
- Two-stage list sample design used for freestanding ambulatory survey component (facilities and patient visits)
- Each sampled facility selects systematic sample of patient visits from randomly selected 4-week reporting period
53.7 Available at
https://ftp.cdc.gov/pub/Health_Statistics/NCHS/Datasets/NHAMCS/
53.12 Special Notes
- See National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NAMCS) for related survey directed at the physician rather than the facility.
- NHAMCS will cease after the collection and processing of the 2022 annual data file.
- See https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/ahcd/notice.htm for data notices.