Inpatient and emergency department costs from sports injuries among youth aged 5–18 years

OBJECTIVE: To analyse the financial costs from sports injuries among inpatients and emergency department (ED) patients aged 5-18 with a focus on Medicaid patients. METHODS: Fixed-effects linear regression was used to assess the association of patient factors with cost of injury from sports. Florida Agency for Health Care Administration data from 2010 to 2014 were used, which included all inpatient and ED patients aged 5-18 years who had a sports injury. RESULTS: Over 5 years, sports injuries in Florida youth cost $24 million for inpatient care and $87 million for ED care. Youth averaged $6039 for an inpatient visit and $439 for an ED visit in costs from sports injuries. Sports injuries for Medicaid-insured youth cost $10.8 million for inpatient visits and $44.2 million for ED visits. CONCLUSION: Older athletes and males consistently have higher healthcare costs from sports. Baseball, basketball, bike riding, American football, roller-skating/skateboarding and soccer are sports with high costs for both ED patients and inpatients and would benefit from prevention programmes. Injuries from non-contact sport participants are few but can have high costs. These athletes could benefit from prevention programmes as well.