Casual Attendances at an Accident Department and a Health Centre

Abstract

In six months patients from a defined population of 11,417 provided 826 casual attendances for minor conditions at a hospital accident department and 1,430 similar attendances at a health centre treatment room. Attendances at the accident department reached a peak during the early evening, and included relatively more males, more adults, more patients with injuries than with symptoms, and more residents from the area immediately adjoining the hospital.

Care of most of the casual attenders with minor conditions at the health centre treatment room would require additional nursing staff and some reorganization of primary care to enable a doctor to be available at most times. Attendances at night and at week-ends were insufficient to justify a 24-hour service at the health centre.