TITLE:
Determining Length of Stay Patterns in Psychiatric Care: A Survival Analysis Approach at Kisumu County Referral Hospital
AUTHORS:
Hillary Ochieng Otieno, Thomas Mawora
KEYWORDS:
Survival Analysis, Bipolar and Related Disoders, Psychiatry, Kaplan Meier, Psychosis
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Access Library Journal,
Vol.13 No.3,
March
16,
2026
ABSTRACT: Length of stay is a crucial metric in healthcare management, reflecting the duration a patient occupies a hospital bed. According to the Kenya National Commission of Human Rights, around 25% of outpatients and 40% of inpatients are affected by mental health disorders. Kisumu County Referral Hospital (KCRH) is a key provider of mental healthcare services in western Kenya. However, there is a lack of robust data analysis regarding patient flow and length of stay within the psychiatric unit. This study intended to fit a Kaplan-Meier survival model to the length of stay data for psychiatric patients at KCRH. The study used monthly secondary data covering 2018 to 2022, obtained from psychiatric patients’ records at Kisumu County Referral Hospital using a secondary data capture form. The study found the overall median survival time was 8 days. There was no difference in length of time to discharge between males and females (p = 0.66).