[Hospital follow-up of referred patients over a year from the emergency service at a rural health center].

Abstract

We have evaluated the patients that were referred to the referencie hospital from the emergency service of our health center between July 1, 1988, and June 31, 1989, and we have followed them up after their arrival to the hospital. We had cared for 20,546 emergencies, particularly from internal medicine, pediatrics and pediatric surgery, traumatology, plastic surgery and neurosurgery. 636 of these were referred (3.09%), with varying rates for specialities, from 7.1% in gynecology to 0% in dermatology. Only 436 of the referred patients attended the hospital. Of these, 49.3% were discharged, 30.5% were admitted and 20.2% were kept for observation up to 48 hours. The highest rates of admissions were seen in internal medicine, pediatrics and pediatric surgery, general surgery, gynecology and psychiatry. All patients from otorhyno-laringology were discharged, and so were 83.8% from ophthalmology and 62.8% from traumatology-plastic surgery-neurosurgery. It was concluded that there is a need for an improved continuing education of the staff (particularly in some areas of medicine), and better material resources and health education.