Use of Emergency Department by Elderly Patients

Aim: Using of EDs by the geriatric population is being increased in parallel to increase of our geriatric population. Objective of this study was to demonstrate what can be done for the EDs to be more effectively benefited by evaluating clinical and demographic data of the patients over 65 years old who presented to an emergency department. Material and Method: Recordings of the patients who presented to Isparta Public Hospital, ED in 2011 were retrospectively screened. All the data were evaluated through SPSS 17.0 software. Results: Of total 114,522 patients who presented to our ED during the study, 14,645 (12.7%) were geriatrics. Mean age was found as 74,6 ± 6 years. The most common cause of presentation was found as cardiologic problems as 3,120 (21.3%), followed by respiratory system problems as 2,040 (13.9%), gastrointestinal problems as 1,875 (12.8%), neurological problems as 1,512 (10.3%) and musculo-skeletal system problems as 1,230 (8.4%) patients. While 71% of these patients were treated in basis of outpatients, 1,877 patients (12.8%) were hospitalized and 9 patients were lost in the ED. Discussion: Some regional differences may be seen in the follow-up of geriatric patients. We recommend that, each hospital should arrange its ED services considering its patient profile