Emergency Department ; Crowding Index ; Regression Analysis ; Simulation Method
Abstract
The medical emergency departments are suffering from the crowdness of patients, hence the quality of medical service the patients are receiving are getting poorer. Overcrowding of medical emergency departments may incur the waiting time for the treatment, and the improper treatment in time. For the operational control of the emergency department, the crowding index is commonly used to identify the crowding intensity, with which the operation process is managed, and future process can be expected. In this study the composite crowding index is suggested, in which the trend of inpatients rate, the age and acuity of patients, and resource of ED are considered.
The validity of the suggested crowding index is discussed by the regression analysis for the index and the actual number of inpatients, and by the simulation study using the process model and the real data.