Effectiveness of Organizational Interventions to Reduce Emergency Department Utilization: A Systematic Review

2012

BackgroundEmergency department (ED) utilization has dramatically increased in developed countries over the last twenty years. Because it has been associated with adverse outcomes, increased costs, and an overload on the hospital organization, several policies have tried to curb this growing trend. The aim of this study is to systematically review the effectiveness of organizational interventions designed to reduce ED utilization.Methodology/principal findingsWe conducted electronic searches using free text and Medical Subject Headings on PubMed and The Cochrane Library to identify studies of ED visits, re-visits and mortality. We performed complementary searches of grey literature, manual s…