Age-Sex Accuracy Index Chart for Monitoring Distribution of Patients

Abstract

Background: This paper proposes the use of demographic techniques of age-sex accuracy index in medical and healthcare surveillance when data on population exposed to risk are not easily available to compute a prevalence rate. The components of the index are age and sex ratios, and the representation of the ratios in the form of charts facilitates monitoring the distributions of patients’ attendance in health centers. 

Methods: The age-sex data was obtained from the outpatient department (OPD) of the General Hospital Dutsinma, Katsina State, Nigeria for the first month of each quarter of 2012. Wilcoxon signed-rank test was applied to test the significance of the differences between distributions of patients, and differences between time periods. The age ratios were used to determine over attendance and under attendance of patient, and the sex ratios were used to determine the sex groups of patient with higher and lower attendance across the age groups. 

Results: Children aged less than five years had the maximum OPD over-attendance followed by the oldest age group (60–64 years) with the male-to-female ratio of 162:100 and 161:100, respectively. Thus about 62% of the patients aged below five years, and 61% aged between 60–64 years were males. The age group with the highest proportion of female OPD attendance was 20–24 years with the male-to-female ratio of 33:100, that is about 67% in the age group were females. Hence, women in the child-bearing age groups (15–34 years) had the highest proportion of attendance in the hospital. The same pattern was observed in all quarters of the year under consideration. 

Conclusion: The paper recommends use of age-sex accuracy index chart as a simple technique in analyzing the distributions of patients based on age groups when data on population exposed to risk are not easily available to compute a prevalence rate.