The SASD contain clinical and resource-use information that is included in a typical discharge abstract, with safeguards to protect the privacy of individual patients, physicians, and hospitals (as required by data sources). The SASD contain more than 100 clinical and nonclinical variables included in a hospital discharge abstract. The SASD are well suited for research that requires complete enumeration of ambulatory surgery in hospital-owned facilities within market areas or States. Used with the SID, the SASD may be used to compare inpatient surgery data with ambulatory surgery data. The SASD promote comparative studies of health care services and support health care policy research on a variety of topics.
