my @Search = qw( 6280 3141 2718 1414 ); my %frequency; for my $Search (@Search) { for my $diag ( keys %diags ) { if( my @found = grep { $_ eq $Search } @{$diags{$diag}} ) { my $found = join ",", @found; print "Primary diagnosis: $diag, $found\n"; $frequency{$Search}++; } } }