Who uses the emergency room services?
This study aimed to clarify whether patients attending an emergency room generally had non-urgent problems. A study was made of 2841 patients attending the emergency room of Prince Zaid Ben Al-Hussein military hospital (south Jordan) over a 1-month period using data from the registration book. Patients were classified into four classes of urgency (life-threatening, urgent, non-urgent, trivial). The attendees were mainly children (26.4%). The admission rate was 3.2% and non-urgent conditions accounted for 91% of cases. Much of the use of emergency services was found to be inappropriate, a situation which should be changed.
Royal Jordanian Medical Services, Amman, Jordan.
A M
AM
Abdallat
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I
al-Smadi
M D
MD
Abbadi
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D017677:Age Distribution; D000368:Aged; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004630:Emergencies; D004636:Emergency Service, Hospital / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005260:Female; D006300:Health Services Misuse / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006302:Health Services Research; D006772:Hospitals, Military / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007597:Jordan; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D020380:Needs Assessment; D010342:Patient Acceptance of Health Care / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D010343:Patient Admission / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D010353:Patient Education as Topic; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D014218:Triage