Frequent attendance in emergency departments is more common among home care clients

Background  Finnish emergency departments (ED) have been under heavy stress, partly due to problems with social and healthcare services. This study examines the relationship between frequent use of ED and the costs of assisted living with 24/7 services, home care and informal care among older people.

Methods  Register data from year 2017 was used, which included costs of service use. ED visits during the year were retrieved from the Finnish care register. Frequent use was defined as four or more ED visits during the year (n=19,002). The reference group was older people over the age of 74 with 0-3 visits during the year (n=515,010). Logistic regression was used to analyse the association between costs of care services for older people and frequent use of ED.

Results  Increased costs of home care were associated with frequent use of ED (OR=3,83). Costs of assisted living with 24/7 services (OR=0,40) and the maximum use of the monetary support for informal care were negatively associated with frequent use of ED (OR=0,68).

Conclusions  Use of care services for older people affects the frequent use of ED. Improving the quality and quantity of home care services and accessibility of assisted living facilities with 24/7 services can reduce ED visits among older people.

Visa Väisänen, Moona Huhtakangas, Timo Sinervo