Articles: hospital-emergency-service.
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We examined six factors that may help to explain why parents take their children to hospital emergency departments: arrival time; travel time; who decided the patient should go; did the patient have a physician; did the parent attempt physician contact, and where the parent would have preferred to have gone for treatment. Results indicate that 47% of the nonemergency visits occurred during the time when physicians maintain office hours. Most visits were made by patients living less than 15 minutes away from the hospital. ⋯ Most parents did not try to contact a physician prior to the visit. Indeed, 46% of the parents preferred to take their children to the emergency department rather than to a physician's office. Finally, 74% of the parents who attempted some contact with a member of the health care system were referred to the emergengy department for care.
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Soc Work Health Care · Jan 1978
Emergency department social work: a program description and analysis.
This article reports on the development of a social work component in the Emergency Department of a teaching-research hospital. It examines the rationale for developing the service and the objectives of the program. It also presents a statistical analysis of the first 2 full years of service. Finally, some of the major problems experienced in establishing such a program are discussed and possible solutions recommended.