Use of medical emergency call data as a marker of quality of emergency department care in the post-National Emergency Access Target era

Objectives Any new model of care should always be accompanied by rigorous monitoring to ensure that there are no negative consequences, especially any that impact upon patient safety. In 2013, ‘THERMoSTAT’ (Two- Hour Evaluation and Referral Model for Shorter Turnaround Times), an emergency department model of care developed by Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital staff was launched to gain efficiencies and improve hospital National Emergency Access Target (NEAT) compliance. The aim of this study was to trial the use of medical emergency call data as a novel marker of the quality of care delivered by our emergency department. Methods Incidence of medical emergency calls for hospital emergency admission patients for the 2 years pre- and 1 year post-THERMoSTAT were compared after standardising for overall hospital activity. Results During the study period, hospital activity increased 10%, and the emergency department experienced a total of 222 645 presentations, 68 000 (30.5%) of which converted into an admission. THERMoSTAT improved NEAT compliance by 17% (from 57.7% to 74.9%) with no change in any patient-safety indicators. A total of 8432 medical emergency calls were made on 5930 patients, 2831 of whom were emergency admissions. After adjusting for hospital activity, there was no change in the average number of patients per week who triggered a medical emergency call after the introduction of THERMoSTAT. These results were reproduced when data was analysed for: total number of inpatients triggering calls; emergency admission patients; and emergency admission patients within the first 24 h or first 4 h of admission. Conclusions This is the first report to investigate the correlation between inpatient medical emergency call incidence and emergency department model of care. Medical emergency call data showed significant promise as a measure of morbidity and as a more direct, objective, simple, quantitative and meaningful measure of patient safety. What is known about the topic? It is well established that extended emergency department lengths of stay are associated with poorer patient outcomes. The corollary of this is not always true however; shorter emergency department length of stay does not automatically translate into better care. Although the underlying philosophy of NEAT is to enhance patient care, there is a risk of negative consequences if NEAT is seen as an end in itself. Many of the commonly used emergency department key performance indicators focus on the timeliness of care and there is a scarcity of easily quantifiable markers that reliably reflect the quality of that care. What does this paper add? This study builds on the concept of medical emergency call incidence as a marker of safety and quality. It explores the utility of using the number of medical emergency calls made in the first few hours of an emergency admission as an indicator of the quality of care delivered by the emergency department. This is significant because it introduces a measure that has a focus that embraces more than the timeliness of care only. What are the implications for practitioners? If medical emergency call incidence in early emergency admissions can be proven to accurately reflect emergency department quality of care then it would provide an easily monitored, objective, quantitative and prompt measure that evaluates dimensions other than timeliness.