https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Health-and-Life-Sciences/Programming-specifications/m-p/50713#M1401 This shouldn't be too difficult, unless if you data is structured in an odd way.<BR /> You can use lag or retain to check if the encounter is to be counted, and retain to keep track of the number of qualifying encounter per patient. When reading the last record for each patient, just out the ones that has 3 or more qualifying encounters.<BR /> <BR /> Good luck!<BR /> <BR /> /Linus Fri, 03 Jul 2009 12:32:52 GMT LinusH 2009-07-03T12:32:52Z https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Health-and-Life-Sciences/Programming-specifications/m-p/50712#M1400 I've encountered a metric spec in one of our incentive program specifications which I've never had to program before. I can't come up with any pragmatic method that will render a solution.<BR /> <BR /> The wording is as follows:<BR /> "Number of patients as defined in the eligible population for whom 3 or more professional encounters exist that are at least 7 days apart."<BR /> <BR /> I've tried using lag,lag2,lagn.... functions to do this, but this would require hundreds of lines of code to accomodate patients with a dozen or more encounter dates.<BR /> <BR /> Any help is appreciated. Thank you. Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:23:07 GMT https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Health-and-Life-Sciences/Programming-specifications/m-p/50712#M1400 deleted_user 2009-07-01T20:23:07Z https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Health-and-Life-Sciences/Programming-specifications/m-p/50713#M1401 This shouldn't be too difficult, unless if you data is structured in an odd way.<BR /> You can use lag or retain to check if the encounter is to be counted, and retain to keep track of the number of qualifying encounter per patient. When reading the last record for each patient, just out the ones that has 3 or more qualifying encounters.<BR /> <BR /> Good luck!<BR /> <BR /> /Linus Fri, 03 Jul 2009 12:32:52 GMT https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Health-and-Life-Sciences/Programming-specifications/m-p/50713#M1401 LinusH 2009-07-03T12:32:52Z https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Health-and-Life-Sciences/Programming-specifications/m-p/50714#M1402 Can you give us an example of your data ? Fri, 03 Jul 2009 13:03:35 GMT https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Health-and-Life-Sciences/Programming-specifications/m-p/50714#M1402 GertNissen 2009-07-03T13:03:35Z