Incidence of patients leaving against medical advice in government-subsidized hospitals: a descriptive retrospective study.

Introduction: this study aimed to determine the prevalence of leaving against medical advice (LAMA) in the local context and the associated predictors to help develop effective strategies to reduce its likelihood.

Methods: this study employed a retrospective approach using medical records of the 16233 patients between 2016 and 2020 at various government-subsidized hospitals in the Hail region of Saudi Arabia.

Results: the prevalence of LAMA was the highest in 2019 (91.