Association of emergency department albuterol dispensing with pediatric asthma revisits and readmissions.

Introduction: Although pediatric asthma continues to be a highly studied disease, data to suggest clear strategies to decrease asthma related revisits or readmissions is lacking. The purpose of our study was to assess the effect of emergency department (ED) direct dispensing of beta-agonist metered dose inhalers on pediatric asthma ED revisit and readmission rates.

Methods: We conducted a retrospective cohort study of pediatric patients discharged from the pediatric ED with a diagnosis of asthma.

Impact of a Hospitalwide Quality Improvement Initiative on Emergency Department Throughput and Crowding Measures.

Background: This pre- and postintervention analysis evaluates the impact of a systemwide, comprehensive, executively supported quality improvement (QI) project on emergency department (ED) throughput measures and crowding in a large nonacademic community hospital.

Methods: The two primary endpoints used to assess the impact of the project were (1) the percentage of all patients who were door-in to door-out in less than three hours and (2) the percentage of patients who left without being seen (LWBS). Secondary endpoints for throughput were mean door-in to door-out, door-in to physician, physician to disposition, and disposition to door-out times for all patients.