Consultation length in ambulatory clinic of Belgrade Emergency Medical Service

Abstract

The aim of the study was to analyze and compare consultation lengths in Emergency Medical Service (EMS) Belgrade ambulatory clinic which relates to patient age, gender, existing diagnoses and prescribed treatment (therapy or referral to another healthcare institution). We analyzed the data from the electronic database on consultation lengths from one EMS Belgrade Ambulatory Clinic. For patients who were further referred to another healthcare institution transfer, the waiting time was included in the total consultation time. We used the statistical package SPSS 11.0 for Windows for the statistical processing. Statistical significance was defined for the level of p < 0.05. The average consultation time was 21.07 ± 13.44 minutes. Usually, it lasted between 10 to 20 minutes. Consultations lasted longer in female patients (21.68 minutes), patients over 65 years of age (24.65 minutes), in patients with multiple diagnoses (26.1 and 27.28 minutes), as well as in patients where therapy was prescribed and administered in the ambulatory clinic (25.72 minutes), or in patients referred to other healthcare institutions. Statistically, the differences were highly significant (p < 0.01). When considering patients' diagnoses, longest consultations were in patients diagnosed with infectious diseases (average 30.88 minutes), followed by patients diagnosed with diseases of the circulatory system (27.86 minutes) and patients with diseases of the respiratory system (21.56 minutes). The differences were statistically significant (p < 0.01). Patients' age, gender, disease diagnosis and administered therapy affect the consultations time. Depending on the diagnosis, consultations last longer for infectious, cardiovascular and respiratory diseases.