The survey of Ways of Reducing Patients’ Length of Stay in the Emergency Department: A Systematic Review

Introduction: In recent decades, increasingly crowded emergency departments(ED) cause considerable burden on the world's health care systems. Among thereasons for this bustle is the lengthy stay of patients.Methods: In this study, a systematic review was used, and the requiredinformation, with the purpose of focusing on the research question, wasretrieved, evaluated, and integrated.Results: The results of analyzing the data of 11 selected papers with theinclusion criteria and keywords specified from 2007 to 2014 in line with theresearch question suggests that there are various methods to reduce theEmergency Department Length Of Stay (EDLOS) of patients which aresummarized in several classes.Equipping and improving of existing facilities in emergency departments, suchas triage, observation units, operating and testing rooms, and advanced imagingneeded by patients as well as modifying caring processes and adequate staffingare listed as the most important factors affecting the reduced length of stay.Conclusion: Improving existing structures in the emergency department,facilitating the processes of care, and providing adequate staffing are amongthe factors that significantly cause the reduced EDLOS. The reduced EDLOS,as a result, causes overcrowding to be reduced, the capacity to accept newpatients as well as patient and nurses satisfaction to be increased, and also thequality of medical care to be improved.

The survey of Ways of Reducing Patients’ Length of Stay in the Emergency Department: A Systematic Review Keywords:

Emergency Department , Length of Hospital Stay , Nurse , Iran