Hospitalizations for chronic pancreatitis in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, USA

Population-based estimates for chronic pancreatitis (CP) are scarce. We determined incident CP hospitalization rates and the risk of pancreatitis-related readmissions in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, USA.

We used Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council (PHC4) dataset to identify all unique White and Black Allegheny County residents with incident hospitalization for CP from years 1996-2005. We noted presence of alcoholism codes (from one year before index hospitalization until last contact) and pancreatitis-related readmissions until the third quarter of 2007. Age-, sex-, and race-adjusted (to US 2000 population) rates/100,000 were calculated.

988 unique County residents with incident hospitalization for CP were identified. Of these, 37.6% also received alcoholism codes. Overall hospitalization rate was 7.75/100,000 (95% CI 7.26-8.24), which remained stable throughout the study period. Patients with alcoholism codes were significantly younger (47.2 vs. 58.0 years), more likely to be male (71.4 vs. 36.6%), and Black (38.5 vs. 17.7%). Hospitalization rates were significantly higher (2.4-fold) in Blacks (vs. Whites), particularly for those with alcoholism codes. During follow-up (median 45 months), pancreatitis-related readmissions were common, significantly more so for patients with alcoholism codes.

CP hospitalization rates over a one-decade period were stable. Readmissions were highest among patients with a diagnosis of alcoholism. and IAP.