Of 1,384,025 hospitalizations, 11,304 encounters from 8097 patients met criteria to be index hospitalizations. Most index hospitalizations were inpatient hospitalizations (74.8%) versus observation hospitalizations (25.2%).

We report the baseline characteristics of the cohort. The mean age of patients was 73.5 years (95% CI 70.7–76.8).

The cohort consisted of 19.8% current smokers and 66.9% previous smokers. The median Charlson score was 3 (interquartile range 3-4).

The severity of illness at the time of hospitalization was Laboratory Acute Physiology Score, version 212,13 of 80.3 (95% CI 72.6–85.9).

The mean length of stay was 4.1 days (95% CI 3.5–5.2 days).

Most patients had advanced care directives of full code at the time of discharge (68.6%).

Most patients were discharged home (74.6%) with only 3.6% referred to hospice.

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