![]() ![]() The choice of our surveyed population to go to the ED might be a reasonable one based on their past experiences or their own assessment of their current needs. 11 Locally, there are few alternatives to the ED after typical weekday business hours and few, if any, primary care clinics are able to offer imaging, diagnostic tests, and treatments such as casts or intravenous therapy. While injury presentation appears to be a consistent predictor of not seeking alternative care, other factors that were found to have statistically significant effects by Han et al, including living arrangements, smoking status, and whether or not the patient had a family doctor, were not found to have significant effects in this study. The data revealed that half of low-acuity ED patients attempted to access care elsewhere before presenting to the ED, which is consistent with the findings of Han et al. This study described the characteristics of patients presenting to an urban ED with low-acuity issues and assessed their attempts to seek alternative health care before arriving there. Independent living (eg, house, apartment). ![]() Understanding the patterns of access or attempted access to alternative care before accessing the ED might help inform policy decisions on interventions to reduce ED wait times and costs, and it might provide more accessible primary care options.ĭID NOT ATTEMPT ALTERNATIVE CARE (N = 116) For the purposes of this article, we will refer to other primary care services outside of the ED as alternative care. The purpose of this study is to describe the patterns of use of other primary health care services (family doctors, walk-in clinics, telephone support) before accessing the ED of patients who present for low-acuity medical issues. 5– 7 In North America, the frequency of ED visits for low-acuity issues has been found to be higher in populations that are younger, are male, are homeless, have lower socioeconomic status, and have no regular primary health care provider. 4, 5 Previous research has suggested that patients present to the ED for low-acuity issues for many reasons, including perceiving their issues as very urgent, trust in the hospital, proximity of the hospital to their home, expediency of being seen by a doctor, and referral from another physician to the ED. 3Įmergency department visits for low-acuity or non-urgent issues make up 25% to 30% of ED visits across Canada. 1 Patients presenting to the ED for nonurgent, low-acuity medical conditions also contribute to ED overcrowding and worsen long ED wait times, 2 although there is some evidence suggesting low-complexity patients have a negligible effect on wait times for patients with higher acuity. With rising health care costs in Canada and internationally, there is incentive to divert these cases from the ED and manage them in a more cost-effective primary care visit. Emergency departments (EDs) in Canada are designed to give near-immediate access to care for critically ill patients in their times of need. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |