Background: This study aims to carry out a cross-sectional analysis of the applications during three months to the Pediatric Emergency Service of İzmir University of Health Sciences, Tepecik Training and Research Hospital and determination of demographical features and distribution of cases in line with provided data and planning the positive changes and innovations in the current service and functioning of the Pediatric Emergency Service.
Methods: The file records of 46038 patients between the ages of 0-18 who applied to the University of Health Science, Tepecik Training and Research Hospital Pediatric Emergency Training Clinic were examined retrospectively in this study.
Results: A total of 46038 patients (53.6% male) applied to the emergency service. The average age was 7.07 for both genders. In the application, the average age of the patients with a history of trauma was 9.3, whereas the average age of the patients without a history of trauma is 6.7. While 82.7% of the patients was male with no trauma history, 86.9% was female without a history of trauma. When the application diagnoses were examined, the most common diagnosis was Upper Respiratory Infection (58.5%). More than half of the applications were monitored in the emergency observation unit (62.5%). When the patients were evaluated according to age groups, 49.2% of them were the children aged between 1-6. While 10.5% of the applicants were infants, and 38.7% were game children, it was noteworthy that the number of male patients was higher in the 1-6 age group, with 54.7%. There was no trauma in 49.5% of the cases. 78,3% of the cases were applied directly to the Paediatric Emergency. Secondly, 16.6% were to the Green Area-1 and Green Area-2. 98.2% of the cases were applied to the Emergency Service for ambulatory care. The 48.8% of the applications were made out of working hours. 97.6% of the cases were not hospitalized for the treatment and were addressed to home. The average staying period of the hospitalized cases in the Service was 4.53 days. Among applications, seven cases died.
Conclusion: Most of the patients admitted to pediatric emergency service for non-urgent reasons which can be managed in primary care services.