Increased demand for services provided in hospital emergency departments

Abstract

Increase in demand for health services in HED (Hospital Emergency Department) and their increasing this greater overcrowding is known from the English language as overcrowding. The concept of overcrowding is also inherently related to the notion of frequent use of assistance in the SOR. However, no uniform criterion for defining this concept has been developed so far. The aim of this study is to present the causes of the phenomenon of overcrowding and the related issues of patients’ functioning in the health care system. The main reasons for this phenomenon are the demographic aspect, i.e. the extension of the average age of many societies, but also the tendency of patients to omit medical assistance at the primary health care level and go directly to the HED as facilities with greater diagnostic and therapeutic possibilities. The consequences of the overcrowding phenomenon are, above all, an increase in the costs of HED functioning, longer waiting times for health services provided in the HED and excessive workload of the staff employed there. Currently, overcrowding has been recognized as a global public health problem.