One out of every eight visits to U.S. hospital emergency departments in 2007 involved adults with a mental disorder, substance abuse problem, or both, according to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. Mental health and/or substance abuse-related visits were two and a half times more likely to result in hospital admissions than visits that involved neither, with nearly 41 percent of mental disorder and/or substance abuse-related visits resulted in hospitalization.
"Not only is this of concern to members of the mental health community, but also to the members of the emergency medicine community who are concerned that ED overcrowding results in decreased quality of care and increased likelihood of medical error," the report reads. "As a specific example, a 2008 American College of Emergency Physicians' ED directors' survey reported that patients with MHSA conditions not only have had increased ED boarding times, but also that the resource-intensive care required for these patients has an impact on the quality of care for all other patients in the ED."
Medicare was billed for 30 percent of all mental health and/or substance abuse ED visits. Hospitals billed private insurers for 26 percent; the uninsured for 21 percent; and Medicaid for 20 percent.
The data comes from Mental Health and Substance Abuse-Related Emergency Department Visits among Adults, 2007, which is based on a sample of 26 million ED visits to about 1,000 community hospitals.
To learn more:
- read the report from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
- read the press release
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