Winning in winter with marginal gains: enhancing welfare on the frontline

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (5) ◽  
pp. 204-208
Author(s):  
Mark Robert-Blunn
Keyword(s):  
Urban Areas ◽  
Waiting Times ◽  
Service Performance ◽  
Ambulance Service ◽  
Hospital Emergency ◽  
Positive Difference ◽  
Performance Targets ◽  
Emergency Ambulance ◽  
Hospital Emergency Departments ◽  
Second Wave

Winter pressures on the NHS challenge every one of us. Patients may experience delays waiting for emergency ambulances and face extended waiting times at hospital emergency departments (ED). During this season, GPs, hospitals, NHS organisations and staff will face increased demand for services; yet are still required to deliver on agreed performance targets with only a finite availability of resources. Add Brexit and the second wave of COVID-19 wave into the mix and it might appear difficult to make improvements in any of these areas. During the winter of 2019–2020, a large ambulance service in England introduced a ‘welfare van’ to support busy emergency ambulance crews in one of its busy urban areas. It was tasked to see if it could make a positive difference to staff welfare and uphold or improve on ambulance service performance during a period of expected increased demand.

Health status and use of health services among recently arrived men with refugee backgrounds: a comparative analysis of urban and regional settlement in South-east Queensland

2011 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 66 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ignacio Correa-Velez ◽  
Adrian G. Barnett ◽  
Sandra M. Gifford ◽  
Donata Sackey
Keyword(s):  
Health Status ◽  
Health Services ◽  
Emergency Departments ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Full Potential ◽  
Hospital Emergency ◽  
Hospital Emergency Departments ◽  
Refugee Men ◽  
Use Of Health Services

Approximately one-third of refugee and humanitarian entrants to Australia are adult men. Many of these men and their families settle in regional areas. Little is known about the health status of refugee men and the use of health services, and whether or not there are differences between those living in urban and regional areas. This paper reports on the cross-sectional differences in health status and use of health services among a group of 233 recently arrived refugee men living in urban and regional areas of South-east Queensland. Overall, participants reported good levels of subjective health status, moderate to good levels of well-being, and low prevalence of mental illness. Men living in urban areas were more likely to have a long-standing illness and report poorer health status than those settled in regional areas. In contrast, men living in regional areas reported poorer levels of well-being in the environment domain and were more likely to visit hospital emergency departments. Targeted health promotion programs will ensure that refugee men remain healthy and develop their full potential as members of the Australian community. Programs that facilitate refugees’ access to primary health care in regional areas may promote more appropriate use of hospital emergency departments by these communities.

Epidemiological study of emergency ambulance activation in the British Eastern Sovereign Base Area of Cyprus, September 2013 to August 2016

2018 ◽  
Vol 165 (3) ◽  
pp. 159-162
Author(s):  
Sophie Jefferys ◽  
A J Martin-Bates ◽  
A Harold ◽  
R Withnall
Keyword(s):  
Epidemiological Study ◽  
Local Community ◽  
Road Traffic ◽  
Clinical Skills ◽  
Ambulance Service ◽  
Significant Shift ◽  
Hospital Emergency ◽  
Traffic Incidents ◽  
Base Area ◽  
Emergency Ambulance

ObjectivesTo record the activation and use of the Eastern Sovereign Base Area (ESBA) emergency ambulance service of British Forces Cyprus between 1 September 2013 and 31 August 2016. To reflect on these findings in light of data from 1995 to 1998 to identify current treads and areas of development.MethodRetrospective epidemiological study of all activations of the ESBA emergency ambulance service within the study period.Results812 patients were treated over 3 years, an 80% increase in workload, of which 41% were entitled personnel. Forty-two per cent of activations were for medical complaints compared with 41% for trauma. The number of deaths remained static (n=15). Road traffic incidents (RTI) remain the top activation by type, but accounting for a smaller proportion of workload. RTI mortality has declined by 50%.ConclusionThe ESBA emergency ambulance service responded to double the activations, when compared with 18 years ago, with a significant shift to medical cases over trauma. This ESBA emergency ambulance provides a varied and vital service for the local community that also benefits Defence Medical Services personnel interested in the Pre-Hospital Emergency Medicine environment in order to maintain clinical skills and currency for the benefit of future deployments, both humanitarian and kinetic in nature.

scholarly journals Is there equity in emergency medical care? Waiting times and walk-outs in South Western Sydney hospital emergency departments

1998 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammed Mohsin ◽  
Adrian Bauman ◽  
Sue Ieraci
Keyword(s):  
Socioeconomic Status ◽  
Emergency Departments ◽  
Waiting Times ◽  
Emergency Medical Care ◽  
Lower Socioeconomic Status ◽  
Hospital Emergency ◽  
Lower Socioeconomic ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Hospital Emergency Departments ◽  
Area Health

This study explores the association between selected socioeconomic characteristics ofemergency patients with waiting times in emergency departments and walk-outs (thosewho did not wait for treatment) in South Western Sydney Area Health Servicehospital emergency departments. Bivariate and multivariate analyses indicated thatwaiting times to see a doctor and walk-out rates varied by age, sex, country of birth,insurance status, socioeconomic status, severity of patient illness and day of arrival.Patients who were female, from a non-English-speaking background, self-referred,uninsured and those from lower socioeconomic status showed significantly longerwaiting times than others. Patients who left emergency departments without treatmentshowed higher waiting times from arrival to triage than other groups. This appliedacross socioeconomic categories. These findings indicate that prolonged waiting timesfor triage, which occur at the busiest periods, may be one of the main indicators forpatients leaving emergency departments without treatment. The study alsodemonstrates variability in waiting times, which could possibly be partly addressedby more standardised triage policies, but may be influenced by other non-clinicalfactors, which require further investigation.

Disaster Preparedness: Hospital Decontamination and the Pediatric Patient— Guidelines for Hospitals and Emergency Planners

2008 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 166-173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher W. Freyberg ◽  
Bonnie Arquilla ◽  
Baruch S. Fertel ◽  
Michael G. Tunik ◽  
Arthur Cooper ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Disaster Preparedness ◽  
Mental Hygiene ◽  
Emergency Situation ◽  
Chemical Agent ◽  
Hospital Emergency ◽  
Department Of Health ◽  
Policies And Procedures ◽  
Patient Guidelines ◽  
Hospital Emergency Departments

AbstractIn recent years, attention has been given to disaster preparedness for first responders and first receivers (hospitals). One such focus involves the decontamination of individuals who have fallen victim to a chemical agent from an attack or an accident involving hazardous materials. Children often are overlooked in disaster planning. Children are vulnerable and have specific medical and psychological requirements. There is a need to develop specific protocols to address pediatric patients who require decontamination at the entrance of hospital emergency departments. Currently, there are no published resources that meet this need. An expert panel convened by the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene developed policies and procedures for the decontamination of pediatric patients.The panel was comprised of experts from a variety of medical and psychosocial areas.Using an iterative process, the panel created guidelines that were approved by the stakeholders and are presented in this paper.These guidelines must be utilized, studied, and modified to increase the likelihood that they will work during an emergency situation.

scholarly journals Hospital Emergency Room Savings via Health Line S24 in Portugal

Econometrics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 8
Author(s):  
Paula Simões ◽  
Sérgio Gomes ◽  
Isabel Natário
Keyword(s):  
National Health ◽  
Hospital Costs ◽  
Urgent Care ◽  
Hospital Emergency ◽  
Health Econometrics ◽  
Emergency Situations ◽  
Hospital Emergency Room ◽  
Major Factors ◽  
Hospital Emergency Departments ◽  
Weighted Values

Hospital emergency departments are often overused by patients that do not really need urgent care. These admissions are one of the major factors contributing to hospital costs, which should not be allowed to compromise the response and effectiveness of the National Health Services (SNS). The aim of this study is to perform a detailed spatial health econometrics analysis of the non-urgent emergency situations (classified by Manchester triage) by area, linking them with the efficient use of the national health line, the Saude24 line (S24 line). This is evaluated through the S24 savings calls, using a savings index and its spatial effectiveness in solving the non-urgent emergency situations. A savings call is a call by a user whose initial intention was to go to an urgency department, but who. after calling the S24 line. changed his/her mind. Given the spatial nature of the data, and resorting to INLA in a Bayesian paradigm, the number of non-urgent cases in the Portuguese urgency hospital departments is modeled in an autoregressive way. The spatial structure is accounted for by a set of random effects. The model additionally includes regular covariates and a spatially lagged covariate savings index, related with the S24 savings calls. Therefore, the response in a given area depends not only on the (weighted) values of the response in its neighborhood and of the considered covariates, but also on the (weighted) values of the covariate savings index measured in each neighbor, by means of a Bayesian Poisson spatial Durbin model.

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