A Boston U. School of Medicine study found men are more likely than women to be readmitted to the hospital within 30 days of original discharge, according to a press release.

Returning to the hospital 30 days after discharge is costly and an indication of poor quality of care, according to the Thursday press release. The study, which was posted online at BMJ Open on Wednesday, may lead to interventions connecting men to primary care resources.

“Identifying and addressing risk factors associated with early post discharge hospital utilization is useful so that resources can be efficiently tailored to each individual patient’s risk profile,” said senior author Brian Jack, BUSM professor of family medicine and principal investigator of Boston Medical Center’s project called Re-Engineered Discharge.

RED is devoted to developing tests and strategies to improve the hospital discharge process so patients remain safe and are not likely to be re-hospitalized.

“Some risk factors like gender, however, may seem inherently immutable,” Jack said. “Yet, as we demonstrated in this study, male gender is associated with other parameters that could potentially be effectively targeted.”

Using RED clinical data, researchers assessed the association between gender and post-discharge re-hospitalization at BMC.

In the study, 47 out of 100 men and 29 out of 100 women were readmitted. Men were less likely to complete a follow-up appointment with a primary care physician after discharge.

This difference can be attributed to males visiting the emergency department more frequently than females and not understanding their follow-up appointments after leaving the hospital. Forty-nine percent of men make it to their follow-up appointments, compared to 57 percent of women.

Medicare recipients paid about $17.4 billion for hospital readmissions in 2004, according to the release.

Being retired, unmarried and depressed were contributing factors to men’s re-hospitalization, as was not being reached for a follow-up call.