National hospital occupancy of about 85 percent expected by 2032 for adult beds, by 2035 for adult and pediatric beds combined
By Elana Gotkine HealthDay Reporter
FRIDAY, Feb. 21, 2025 (HealthDay News) — Postpandemic hospital occupancy is higher than prepandemic and is expected to continue increasing without changes in the hospitalization rate or staffed hospital bed supply, according to a research letter published online Feb. 19 in JAMA Network Open.
Richard K. Leuchter, M.D., from the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA in Los Angeles, and colleagues repurposed the COVID-19 dashboard to describe several possible U.S. hospital bed occupancy scenarios arising from an aging population over the next decade.
The researchers found that the mean U.S. hospital occupancy was 63.9 percent from 2009 to 2019 compared with 75.3 percent in May 2023 to April 2024, the year following the end of the COVID-19 public health emergency (PHE). There was a decline seen in the number of staffed hospital beds, from a prepandemic steady state of 802,000 to a post-PHE steady state of 674,000; the mean daily census steady state remained at about 510,000. Substantial state-to-state variation was seen in the post-PHE hospital occupancy steady state. With the aging population, total annual hospitalizations were projected to increase from 36,174,000 in 2025 to 40,177,000 in 2035 without changes in the hospitalization rate or staffed hospital bed supply, corresponding to a national hospital occupancy of about 85 percent by 2032 and by 2035 for adult beds and adult and pediatric beds combined, respectively.
“Experts in developed countries have posited that a national hospital occupancy of 85 percent constitutes a hospital bed shortage (a conservative estimate); our findings show that the U.S. could reach this dangerous threshold as soon as 2032, with some states at much higher risk than others,” the authors write.
One author serves on the board of directors of M3 Inc.
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