ArticleJournal of epidemiology and community health1997
A confidential enquiry into emergency hospital admissions on the Isle of Wight, UK.
Article in Journal of epidemiology and community health, 1997. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 18 citations in OpenAlex.
- Use of emergency observation and assessment wards: a systematic literature review.Emergency medicine journal : EMJ · 2003Pooled it
- Hospitalisation Trends for Choroid and Retina Diseases in the Past 20 Years: An Ecological Study in Australia.Clinical optometry · 2023Article
- A report on an acute, in-hours, outpatient review clinic with ultrasonography facilities for the early evaluation of general surgical patients.Annals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England · 2016Article
- EHR in emergency rooms: exploring the effect of key information components on main complaints.Journal of medical systems · 2014Article
- The impact of EHR and HIE on reducing avoidable admissions: controlling main differential diagnoses.BMC medical informatics and decision making · 2013Article
- Using electronic medical record systems for admission decisions in emergency departments: examining the crowdedness effect.Journal of medical systems · 2012Article
- Ophthalmic admissions in a tertiary hospital in Nigeria.African health sciences · 2010Article
- Inappropriate admissions: thoughts of patients and referring doctors.Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine · 2001Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesTo quantify the proportion of potentially avoidable emergency short term admissions to hospital and to identify ways in which they could have been avoided.
designConfidential enquiry by peer review group.
settingSt Mary's Hospital, Newport, Isle of Wight. SUBJECTS: All emergency, short term admissions (discharged home within five days) to medicine, general surgery, orthopaedics, gynaecology, ENT, and ophthalmology specialties for 28 (24 hour) days over a six month period in 1994.
main outcome measuresAppropriateness of admissions decided by the peer group, the peer group's opinion of ideal management, and the patients' views on the appropriateness of their admission.
resultsAltogether 139 cases satisfied the inclusion criteria. Complete data were collected on 123 cases and the peer group considered 81 in the time available. Twenty one of the 81 cases were judged "potentially avoidable". These represent 9.5% (95% CI 6.3%, 13.5%) of short term admissions to the specialties studied. The peer group considered that seven of 10 patients referred by a general practitioner (GP) could have been managed by the GP alone and that the remaining three had been referred appropriately but need not have been admitted had a consultant opinion been available in the accident and emergency (A&E) department. Two of the 10 would have required home support to avoid hospital admission. Five of 11 patients who referred themselves to A&E could have been discharged home without admission and without recourse to a specialist opinion. The remaining six could have been discharged had a consultant opinion been available in A&E.
conclusionsUrgent consultant opinion, either in A&E or in an outpatient clinic, would have prevented most of these inappropriate admissions, and home support would have expedited the ability to discharge some patients. Further research into the costs and benefits of methods for providing these services is needed urgently.
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