EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT DATA SURVEILLANCE PROJECT

The Community Health Improvement Partner’s Violence and Injury Prevention Work Team, in collaboration with the County of San Diego’s Emergency Medical Services (EMS) and the Hospital Association of San Diego and Imperial Counties (HASD&IC), conceptualized and coordinated implementation of the Emergency Department Data Surveillance (EDDS) project.

Emergency department (ED) discharge data describe all patients who were treated and discharged from participating emergency departments in San Diego County. ED data does not represent all patients who go to the emergency department; patients who were admitted to the hospital from the ED are not included. The information contained in this database is collected from billing data, so if a patient presents to the ED and is admitted to that same hospital, all information is transferred to the inpatient record and the patient becomes part of the hospital inpatient discharge database.

Emergency department data that are reported to Emergency Medical Services (EMS) do not contain unique identifiers, such as social security number. Each record represents a visit to the ED; multiple visits for the same person cannot be identified. Therefore, this report represents the number of encounters (visits), not the number of people who use the ED.

Currently, 16 out of the 18 civilian San Diego County EDs voluntarily report data, representing more than 97% of all ED discharges in San Diego County. These data represent medical encounters for less severe non-fatal injury or illness than seen among hospital discharges.

EDDS project data is easily accessible and can be used in a variety of ways for the purposes of public health planning, research, and evaluation. There is great potential in using this aggregated data to identify and implement targeted health interventions to improve outcomes in the areas of chronic conditions, access to care, reduction in injuries, etc.

Emergency Department Data Surveillance Project NEWSLETTER

Emergency Department Data Surveillance Project AGGREGATE REPORT

San Diego and Imperial County Hospitals with Emergency Departments

HASD&IC Hospital Emergency Departments