Evaluation of revisit in the adult emergency department of Akdeniz University Hospital

Aim: Revisit was defined as a patient's return to the emergency department within 72 hours of being discharged from the emergency department. The reasons for revisits, which increase the workload and health expenditures of hospitals, are not fully understood. The aim of this study is to determine the demographic, sociological and clinical characteristics of revisiting patients, and to determine the medical, institutional or individual risk factors of revisits. Our study is to identify revisits to Akdeniz University Hospital Adult Emergency Service between 01.01.2019 and 31.12.2019 after discharge and to examine the characteristics of these admissions. Method: Our study is a retrospective cross-sectional study. There cords of patients discharged from the Adult Emergency Service in 2019 were retrospectively scanned from the Hospital Information Management System. The population of our study consisted of patients who applied again within 72 hours after the first admission. Revisit data was separated from the data obtained from the Hospital Information Management System with a computer software, and the data of these patients were carefully examined and the first visits and revisits were compared. Findings: During the study period, 105,982 patients applied to the emergency department and 3020 (2.8%) patients were included in the study. The mean age of the patients is 40.98. 70% of the patients applied to the hospital again with the same complaint. When the first and second visits are examined, the most common complaints for emergency department visits are; abdominal pain, nausea-diarrhea and itching-redness. The triage category of 62% of the patients did not change. We have 2 patients who were found to be triage category 3 at the first visit and were evaluated as triage category 1 at these cond admission. One patient who was triage category 2 at the first admission and who was triage category 2 at there visit died. Of there visiting patients, 84% were discharged. Conclusion: The rate and reasons for revisits to the emergency department is an important quality criterion according to the studies in the literature. In our study, we found that the rate of revisits to the emergency department was similar to the studies in the literature. It was seen that most of the patients who applied again were discharged and they applied to the emergency service again after their complaints continued. It was thought that revisits could be prevented to a large extent by issuing appropriate prescriptions, providing adequate symptomatic treatment, and informing patients more appropriately. Key Words: Emergency Department, Revisit, Readmission