Table 2. Emergency department characteristics.
| Non-Specific Complaints (N = 244) | Specific Complaints (N = 1540) |
P-value | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mode of referral (%) | 0.20 | ||
| General Practitioner | 185 (78.7%) | 1087 (73.1%) | |
| Self-referral | 25 (10.6%) | 177 (11.9%) | |
| Ambulance | 12 (5.1%) | 145 (9.8%) | |
| Specialist | 13 (5.5%) | 77 (5.2%) | |
| Level of triage (%) | 0.30 | ||
| Low | 85 (34.8%) | 518 (33.6%) | |
| Moderate | 138 (56.6%) | 823 (53.4%) | |
| Urgent | 20 (8.2%) | 188 (12.2%) | |
| No triage | 1 (0.4%) | 11 (0.7%) | |
| No. of problems at presentation, median (IQR) | 2 (1–8) | 1 (1–9) | 0.10 |
| Vital signs, median (IQR) | |||
| Heart rate (min-1) | 84 (35–180) | 83 (40–200) | 0.79 |
| Missing (%) | 9 (3.7%) | 157 (10.2%) | |
| Systolic blood pressure (mmHg) | 135 (118–156) | 140 (123–165) | <0.001* |
| Missing (%) | 7 (2.9%) | 137 (8.9%) | |
| Temperature (°C) | 37.2 (29–40) | 37.3 (31–41) | 0.04* |
| Missing (%) | 8 (3.3%) | 162 (10.5%) | |
| No. of diagnostic tests, mean (SD) | 3.3 (1.7) | 3.1 (1.8) | 0.10 |
| No. of patients with >1 consultation (%) | 19 (7.8%) | 217 (14.1%) | 0.03* |
| ED-LOS in minutes, median (IQR) | 188 (23–421) | 178 (6–970) | 0.004* |
| ICU/MCU admissions (%) | 7 (2.5%) | 39 (2.9%) | 0.67 |
ED = Emergency department. ICU = Intensive Care Unit. MCU = Medium Care Unit. SD = Standard deviation. P-values for NSC-patients vs. SC-patients: using the Chi-square test, unpaired t-test and Mann Whitney U test.
* = P< 0.05.