Publication Date
12-1-2020
Journal
Journal of the American College of Emergency Physicians Open
DOI
10.1002/emp2.12318
PMID
33392536
PMCID
PMC7771828
PubMedCentral® Posted Date
11-20-2020
PubMedCentral® Full Text Version
Post-print
Published Open-Access
yes
Abstract
OBJECTIVE: Our investigation compared throughput metrics and utilization measures for freestanding emergency departments (FSEDs) versus hospital-based emergency departments (HBEDs) of similar volumes in the United States.
METHODS: This study is a cross sectional survey of 183 FSEDs and 317 HBEDs located across the United States using the Emergency Department Benchmarking Alliance (EDBA) Database. We measured common emergency department (ED) throughput metrics. Primary outcomes included overall length of stay, length of stay for admitted, and length of stay for treated and released patients. Outcomes were weighted based on the proportion of ED volume per facility as per a prior pilot study. Multiple linear regression analysis was used to adjust for measured differences between FSEDs and HBEDs. The variables that were controlled for in regression analysis included geographic location of the ED (urban, suburban, and rural), percent of high acuity capacity, ED volume, percentage of patients arriving via emergency medical services (EMS), and percentage of pediatric patients.
RESULTS: Nationally, the median length of stay in minutes (104.2 vs 140.0), length of stay for treated and released patients (98.6 vs 122.9), door-to-bed (4.0 vs 8.0), door-to-doctor (11.0 vs 16.0), percentage of patients admitted through the ED (4.0 vs 11.0), and percentage of patients leaving the ED without being seen (LWBS) (0.9 vs 1.5), were significantly lower at FSEDs compared to HBEDs (
CONCLUSIONS: In this study of similarly sized EDs in the United States, throughput metrics for FSEDs tended to be significantly shorter from the arrival of the patient until their departure, except for patients requiring hospital admission. For measures favoring FSEDs, throughput times range from 20%-50% shorter than HBEDs.
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