Three years ago, the average length of stay (LOS) for admitted ED patients was about 7.5 hours at the 17th Street campus of New Hanover Regional Medical Center in Wilmington, NC. Today, it is down to just more than five hours.
The creation of an "Access Center" to handle interhospital transfer coordination and unscheduled admissions at Saint Francis Hospital in Tulsa, OK, has taken a huge load off the ED and vastly improved the movement of patients into beds.
Delirium, or acute brain dysfunction, is a syndrome that affects many patients in the intensive care unit (ICU). A number of modifiable and non-modifiable risk factors contribute to the development of delirium, such as illness severity, receipt of benzodiazepine medications, and metabolic alterations.
