Effects of mandatory screening labs in directing the disposition of the apparently healthy psychiatric patient in the emergency department.

Objective: To determine whether mandatory psychiatric admission laboratory tests yield results that change the disposition of a patient with primary psychiatric complaint from admission to a psychiatric service to admission to a medical service.

Methods: This was a single center retrospective cohort chart review study approved by the facility Institutional Review Board in which we used a records database maintained by the emergency department's social workers to access the records of every patient that presented to our emergency department with a psychiatric chief complaint between the dates of December 1, 2011, and December 1, 2013. We focused on those that were admitted to either a psychiatric service or a medical service after a thorough evaluation by the department of social work and an emergency provider.