Emergency department crowding and mortality: an observational multicenter study in Sweden

Jens Wretborn; Daniel B Wilhelms; Ulf Ekelund

doi:10.3389/fpubh.2023.1198188

Emergency department crowding and mortality: an observational multicenter study in Sweden

Front Public Health. 2023 Jul 25:11:1198188. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2023.1198188. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Jens Wretborn^{1

2}, Daniel B Wilhelms^{1

2}, Ulf Ekelund³

Affiliations

¹ Department of Emergency Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden.
² Department of Biomedical and Clinical Sciences, Faculty of Health Sciences, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden.
³ Department of Clinical Sciences Lund, Emergency Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Lund University, Lund, Sweden.

Abstract

Background: Emergency department (ED) crowding is a serious problem worldwide causing decreased quality of care. It is reasonable to assume that the negative effects of crowding are at least partially due to high staff workload, but previous crowding metrics based on high workload have not been generalisable to Swedish EDs and have not been associated with increased mortality, in contrast to, e.g., occupancy rate. We recently derived and validated the modified Skåne Emergency Department Assessment of Patient Load model (mSEAL) that measures crowding based on staff workload in Swedish EDs, but its ability to identify situations with increased mortality is unclear. In this study, we aimed to investigate the association between ED crowding measured by mSEAL model, or occupancy rate, and mortality.

Methods: All ED patients from 2017-01-01 to 2017-06-30 from two regional healthcare systems (Skåne and Östergötland Counties with a combined population of approximately 1.8 million) in Sweden were included. Exposure was ED- and hour-adjusted mSEAL or occupancy rate. Primary outcome was mortality within 7 days of ED arrival, with one-day and 30-day mortality as secondary outcomes. We used Cox regression hazard ratio (HR) adjusted for age, sex, arrival by ambulance, hospital admission and chief complaint.

Results: We included a total of 122,893 patients with 168,900 visits to the six participating EDs. Arriving at an hour with a mSEAL score above the 95th percentile for that ED and hour of day was associated with an non-significant HR for death at 7 days of 1.04 (95% CI 0.96-1.13). For one- and 30-day mortality the HR was non-significant at 1.03 (95% CI 0.9-1.18) and 1.03 (95% CI 0.97-1.09). Similarly, occupancy rate above the 95th percentile with a HR of 1.04 (95% CI 0.9-1.19), 1.03 (95%CI 0.95-1.13) and 1.04 (95% CI 0.98-1.11) for one-, 7- and 30-day mortality, respectively.

Conclusion: In this multicenter study in Sweden, ED crowding measured by mSEAL or occupancy rate was not associated with a significant increase in short-term mortality.

Keywords: access block; crowding; emergency department; occupancy; overcrowding.

Publication types

Multicenter Study
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Crowding
Emergency Service, Hospital*
Hospitalization*
Humans
Sweden / epidemiology
Workload