EVALUATION OF THE FREQUENT APPLICATIONS TO AN UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT: A 1-YEAR REVIEW

Abstract

Objective: Frequent use of emergency departments is an important problem that leads to decreased service quality and increased health costs in these departments. In the present study, the purpose was to analyze the demographic and clinical characteristics of “frequent users’ in applications to emergency departments. 
 Material and Methods: In the study, the records of patients, who were aged 18 years and older and who applied to the emergency department of a university hospital in 2016, were analyzed retrospectively. Those who applied to the emergency department between 4 and 9 times were defined as “Low ED Users’, and those who applied for 10 or more were defined as “High ED Users’. 
 Results: In 1 year, a total of 86.287 applications were made to the emergency department by 54.258 patients, during which 5.26% (n=2859) of those who applied to the emergency department applied 4-9 times (Low ED Users) and 0.29% (n=162) applied 10 or more times (High ED Users). Applications made by frequent users (n=16.277) constituted 18.8% of all applications in a year. The most common reason for frequent users’ admission was upper respiratory tract infections and 44.3% of the frequent user referrals were young patients who were under the age of 30. It was found that the patients in the High ED Users group underwent more examination and treatment than the Low ED Users group, and the hospitalization rates were higher in the High ED Users group (p