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If an emergency department (ED) patient with impending sepsis is discharged, returns hours later in septic shock, and dies or develops organ failure, "you're likely to get sued," warns Bruce Wapen, MD, an emergency physician with Mills-Peninsula Emergency Medical Associates in Burlingame, CA.
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Head trauma is a common presenting problem among emergency department (ED) patients. It has been estimated that 1-2 million Americans sustain traumatic brain injury (TBI) annually.
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Hospitals that receive federal funds are required by law to offer language assistance to patients with limited English proficiency (LEP).
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Every day patients flock to EDs with sore throats, headaches, and other non-emergent problems that are more in line with what you would expect a primary care provider (PCP) to handle.
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Mental health experts believe that as with many acute medical conditions such as stroke and heart attack, early diagnosis and treatment can make a critical difference for patients with schizophrenia, potentially limiting the severity and progression of the disease.
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Emergency departments in the United States are frequently confronted with trauma patients with varying degrees of injury.
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The ED is a common setting for the initial evaluation of emotional and behavioral disorders, including suicidal behavior or attempts. In the United States, approximately 2 million adolescents attempt suicide each year. As the number of visits by adolescents to the ED rises and the availability of outpatient mental health services diminishes, the ED physician must be not only able to stabilize the patient medically, but also should be comfortable with differentiating organic from psychiatric disease, performing a targeted psychosocial interview, initiating treatment, and arranging for disposition.
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You know there is a problem when the average wait time to see a provider is in the four-to-five-hour range, and 3% to 7% of incoming patients are routinely leaving the ED without being seen (LWBS).
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The Joint Commission (TJC) is in the process of developing new tools, solutions, and performance measures aimed at improving the processes used to transition patients from one health care setting to another.
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While studies show that most people come to the ED because of an urgent or emergent medical concern, some people wind up in an emergency setting because they are not plugged in to the kind of social or medical resources that could more appropriately meet their needs.
