The proportion of older adults with extended emergency division size of keep (LOS) and boarding occasions elevated from 2017 to 2024, in response to a analysis letter printed on-line June 30 in JAMA Inside Medication.
In a cross-sectional examine, Adrian D. Haimovich, M.D., Ph.D., from the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Middle in Boston, and colleagues examined information from the Epic Cosmos well being data database for January 2017 to December 2024, representing 295 million older adults and 78 million admissions. The authors sought to evaluate extended LOS and boarding occasions.
The researchers discovered that 12% of the 4,564,359 included emergency division affected person encounters had an LOS higher than eight hours in 2017, growing to twenty% of 12,392,737 encounters by 2024. In educational hospitals, the rise was most pronounced, with the proportion of encounters with extended LOS growing from 19 to 30%. Throughout the identical interval, the proportion of boarding sufferers with a mattress request to admission time of greater than three hours elevated from 22 to 36% of all admissions. The rise was largest amongst educational hospitals (31 to 45%). Small annual will increase had been seen in each measures from 2017 to 2020 (LOS, 1.1%; boarding, 2.8%), adopted by a pointy enhance from 2020 to 2022 through the COVID-19 pandemic (LOS, 4.2%; boarding, 6.1%). Between 2022 and 2024, there was partial restoration noticed (LOS, −1.7%; boarding, −3.2%).
“Worsening emergency department LOSs and boarding contribute to emergency department crowding, reflect systemic health care dysfunction, and, most importantly, harm individual patients,” the authors write.
Extra data:
Adrian D. Haimovich et al, Extended Emergency Division Stays for Older US Adults, JAMA Inside Medication (2025). DOI: 10.1001/jamainternmed.2025.2006
Maura Kennedy et al, Addressing the Hospital Boarding Disaster within the US—Time to Act, JAMA Inside Medication (2025). DOI: 10.1001/jamainternmed.2025.2012
Quotation:
2017 to 2024 noticed extra seniors with extended ED size of keep (2025, July 9)
retrieved 9 July 2025
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