Evaluation of primary care visit status and perceived urgency of green area patients admitted to the Pediatric Emergency Department of Akdeniz University Hospital

Evaluation of Primary Care Visit Status and Perceived Urgency of Green Area Patients Admitted to the Pediatric Emergency Department of Akdeniz University Hospital Objective: The aim of this study is to evaluate the primary care visit status of the parents of green area emergency patients admitted to the Pediatric Emergency Department of Akdeniz University Hospital. The study aims to identify the reasons why parents prefer not to visit Family Health Centers (FHCs), reduce the intensity in pediatric emergency services, and contribute to increasing parents' awareness levels in the literature. Additionally, the study aims to contribute to the improvement of FHCs through further studies. Method: In this descriptive and cross-sectional study, face-to-face data collection was conducted using a survey method. The participants who agreed to take part in the study were administered a two-section survey. The first section of the survey contained questions about the participants' sociodemographic characteristics, and the second section included questions related to their visits to the emergency department and family health centers. The data were analyzed using the SPSS 25 (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences – IBM®) software. A 95% confidence interval was used, and a p-value of <0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: In this survey study, interviews with the parents of 338 patients revealed that 58.3% of the patients were in the 5-14 age group, while 32% were in the 0-5 age group. 65.7% of the parents were women, and 93.5% of the parents who brought their children to the emergency department were mothers and fathers. 26% of the patients had chronic diseases, and the most common complaints of the patients were fever, nausea, vomiting, and cough. Most patients were examined within 15 minutes after presenting to the emergency department. 35.2% of the patients had visited another doctor before coming to the emergency department, with 43.7% of these patients seeing a family doctor and 56.3% consulting a pediatrician. Overall, 15.1% of the patients in the study had visited a family doctor before visiting the emergency department. Regarding their healthcare concerns, parents most frequently consulted pediatricians (36.4%), family doctors (30.5%), and family members/neighbors (32%). 42% of the visits to the Family Health Centers (FHCs) were for active complaints, and 30.5% were for vaccination purposes. The findings of the study are consistent with the literature and suggest that increasing health literacy and strengthening referrals to primary care are essential. These findings are expected to contribute to new research aimed at reducing pediatric emergency service workload and improving family medicine practices. Conclusions: The findings of the study reveal the need to enhance health literacy and strengthen referrals to primary care. Moreover, it emphasizes the importance of starting health literacy education from an early age, strengthening family medicine services, and increasing referrals to primary care. These findings may contribute to new research aimed at reducing pediatric emergency service congestion and improving family medicine practices. Keywords: Pediatric emergency, Non-urgent/inappropriate emergency, Primary care, Pediatric emergency department, Family doctor