Hospital outpatient services under Medicare, 1987.

Presented in this article are data related to hospital outpatient services provided for aged and disabled Medicare beneficiaries during calendar year 1987. Trend data are also presented for selected calendar years 1974-87. Hospital outpatient covered charges and Medicare program payments (in total and per enrollee) are the statistics employed to measure the use of hospital outpatient services. The data contained in this article should provide information to help identify trends and patterns of care for monitoring the Medicare hospital outpatient services.