• Peter Jones, Alana Harper, Susan Wells, Elana Curtis, Peter Carswell, Papaarangi Reid, and Shanthi Ameratunga.
• Department of Emergency Medicine, Auckland City Hospital, Vistoria Street West, Auckland, New Zealand. peterj@adhb.govt.nz
• Emerg Med Australas. 2012 Jun 1;24(3):303-12.

ObjectiveDespite the spread of time targets for ED lengths of stay around the world, there have been few studies exploring the effects of such policies on quality of ED care. The Shorter Stays in Emergency Departments (SSED) National Research Project seeks to address this. The purpose of this paper was to describe how the indicators for the SSED study in New Zealand were selected and validated.MethodsA literature review was used to identify potential indicators. A reference group of 25 key stakeholders from across the health system was convened, with the aims of validating the suggested indicators and to ensure that other candidate indicators were not overlooked. A thematic analysis using a general inductive approach was used to analyse focus group discussions.ResultsThe major themes were communication, access, timeliness, appropriateness and satisfaction. The 12 indicators selected after literature review were confirmed and two further indicators added after the thematic analysis. The indicators are: hospital and ED length of stay; re-presentation within 48 h; mortality; times to reperfusion, antibiotics, asthma treatment, analgesia, CT for head injury and to theatre (appendicitis and fractured neck of femur); triage time compliance; proportion who left without being seen; quality of discharge information; and ED overcrowding/access block.ConclusionThrough literature review and consultation with stakeholders, an evidence-based and clinically relevant set of indicators was compiled with which to measure the effect of the SSED target. This indicator set is consistent with recent international recommendations for measuring quality of care in EDs.© 2012 The Authors. EMA © 2012 Australasian College for Emergency Medicine and Australasian Society for Emergency Medicine.

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