Does Having More Admission Diagnoses Increase the Accuracy Rate for Elderly Patients in the Emergency Department?

Abstract

Background: Increasing the accuracy rate of diagnosis at admission to the emergency department is always an important issue for emergency physicians. Those patients, particularly the elderly, who do not have typical symptoms or obvious ailments, are quite difficult to accurately diagnose, which influences their subsequent treatment and final outcomes. Methods: This study was a retrospective chart review of 1,611 patients, from January 1, 2003 to May 31, 2003. All received emergency medical services at the emergency department and were admitted to the hospital before finally being discharged. Results: In our study, there were significant differences among the elderly group (≥ 65 years) regarding sex distribution and length of stay compared with the non-elderly group (< 65 years) (p < 0.01). The length of hospital stay for the elderly group was longer than that for the non-elderly group (10.91 ± 11.30 days vs. 8.14 ± 7.28 days). Conclusion: There was not a significant enough difference between the elderly and non-elderly groups to prove that the number of diagnoses for patients at admission or at discharge increased with patient age. The elderly group had much longer stays than the non-elderly group, regardless of the number of diagnoses at admission or discharge. Patients who had more diagnoses also had a significantly longer length of stay.

Keywords

• accuracy rate
• admission diagnosis
• elderly
• length of stay