Increased Length of Stay in Emergency Department in Turkey: Due to Inappropriate Emergency Department Use or Aging?

• DOI: 10.5336/medsci.2013-34423
• Publication Date: 2014-10-24T07:17:16Z
• Authors: Müge GÜNALP; Behnan GÜLÜNAY; Onur POLAT; Serdar GÜRLER; Arda DEMİRKAN; Meltem AKKAŞ; Nalan METİN AKSU
• Keywords: Overcrowding; Triage; Crowding

Objective: Emergency department (ED) crowding has long been recognized as a ''crisis'' in Turkey. The reasons for overcrowding are high number of patients, limited capacity in-patient clinics, patients aged 65 years age or older, and prolonged length stay ED. This study aimed to investigate the causes increased ED university hospital, Material Methods: was prospective observational carried out over 3 months. We evaluated data outpatients transferred by ambulance hospital Age, gender, triage scores, date time presentation, discharge time, definitive diagnosis categories, were analyzed. Results: mean 1311patients 57.68±19.35 years.The 459.38 minutes (7.39±0.73 hours), 2134 (35.29±3.29 hours). rate (41%) ranked highest among three groups. early older significantly lower, their hospitalization duration higher. At end initial 48 hours, 625 (47.6%) discharged; only 55 (4,1%) could be hospitalized related while 545 (41.5%) followed-up at Observation Clinical Decision Unit emergency physicians. Conclusion: In our study, it determined that longer than 48-hour delay transferring ≥ most important