Impact of an emergency short stay unit on emergency department performance of poisoned patients.

Objectives: This was a before and after study which sought to assess the impact of opening an ED short stay unit (ESSU) on the ED performance of poisoned patients.

Methods: Data was collected from two groups of adult patients presenting to an ED with a tertiary referral inpatient Toxicology unit from the 2009 and 2012 calendar years, to assess the impact of the ESSU. The toxicology unit clinical database and hospital electronic medical records were interrogated for demographic, clinical and hospital flow details of presentations.