Question: A investigator used a Charlotte Hospice length of stay data (admission until death), but restricted his attention to only the Medicare patients. He defined a new variable called MONTH and gave it a value of 1 if patient stayed less than 31 days in hospice, if more than 31 days = 0. Another variable DOC_CANC was categorical variable with 4 levels.

1=patient diagnosed with cancer and referred by oncologist

2=patient diagnosed with cancer and referred by non-oncologist

3=patient not diagnosed with cancer and referred by non-oncologist

4=patient not diagnosed with cancer and referred by oncologist

Using available data estimate odds of staying in hospice less than one month for each level of DOC_CANC variable.