Overcrowded EDs Strain Hospital Resources

A new study has shown that while the number of emergency departments in California (USA) decreased by 12% over the past decade, the number of patients visiting the emergency department more than doubled, to 27%, or about 25,778 annually, straining hospital resources. The findings were reported in the April 2002 issue of the Annals of Emergency Medicine.

During the same period, the study found that the number of critically ill patients to visit each ED increased by 59% and the number of urgent patients increased by 36%. Although nonurgent patients made the most ED visits in 1990, in 1999 urgent patients accounted for the largest group of visits, and there was a significant 30% decrease in the nonurgent visits per ED bed. A lack of empty beds causes EDs to divert ambulances to other hospitals because they can't safely take another acutely ill patient, which has become a nationwide US public health problem.

"For years, insurance companies and health policy advisors have said that emergency departments attract and encourage patients with nonurgent problems,” said Robert W. Derlet, M.D., of the University of California Davis Medical Center (Sacramento, USA), and the author of a related editorial in the same issue. "This study clearly indicates a dramatic increase in patients who need emergency care, which leaves little capacity in the emergency department to care for people with less urgent problems.”