Family Matters? The Importance of Relatives for Frail Elders’ Mortality and Hospital Readmission

We investigate the relationship between availability of relatives and mortality and hospital readmission within 30 days for patients aged 70 and above. The analysis contributes to the existing literature by applying a rich, high-quality data set and by its focus on frail elderly. Using Norwegian register data of 97,920 patients who have had an emergency hospital admission in the period 2009–2013, we employ a linear probability model where we account for a wide range of patient, municipality, and time characteristics. Our results show that having a spouse and at least one child is associated negatively with mortality and positively with readmission. A potential mechanism is that a spouse/child monitors the elder’s health status and acts as an advocate for the elderly, making a readmission more likely, while also reducing the mortality risk. Furthermore, we find that the availability of children is more important for female patients than for male patients, while for male patients the availability of the spouse appears to be more important, at least for readmission.