Objective: The objective of this study was to compare patients with one injury emergency department (ED) visit to patients who had more than one injury ED visit. Methods: A statewide ED database for the years 1996 and 1997 was probabilistically unduplicated to identify unique patients. ICD-9 codes were used to identify and categorize injury related visits. Results: There were 882,556 emergency department visits, of which 381,988 (43%) were injury related visits corresponding to 314,363 unique patients. A total of 49,531 (6%) injury patients had more than one injury visit accounting for 117,156 (31%) of all injury visits. The number of repeat injury visits ranged from 2 to 41. The number of non-injury related visits increased with the number of injury visits (p<0.001). Patients with more than one injury visit were more likely to use government insurance or self-pay (p<0.001). Injury type and mechanism differed between patients with more than one injury visit and those with only one injury visit (p<0.001). Injuries relating to sprains and strains and superficial injuries increased with the number of injury visits while the number of fractures and open wounds decreased. The number of visits coded as falling or overexertion increased with the number of visits, while the number of motor vehicle crashes declined. Conclusions: Patients with many injury related visits have a large number of non-injury encounters. These patients may not have access to appropriate primary care for their medical problems.
Learning Objectives: Participants will understand how to use probabilistic record linkage to unduplicate a database. Participants will be able to describe the characteristics of patients who are heavy users of emergency departments.
Keywords: Emergency Department/Room, Data/Surveillance
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.