Emergency Department Visits

The project aims to evaluate a nurse-led intervention to reduce inappropriate emergency department (ED) use among adult patients seen at Geisinger's Community Medicine Service Line (CMSL) clinics. The intervention occurs immediately following an appointment where a patient receives a diagnosis of an ambulatory sensitive condition (ASC; i.e., a condition considered to be a risk factor for near-term ED use). The evaluation will compare eligible patients with an ASC who were randomly assigned to receive follow-up outreach (patient portal message and/or call) from a nurse (who was automatically prompted via the Epic electronic health record system to initiate outreach) with those who were randomly assigned to receive standard care. Analyses will be intent-to-treat. The primary outcome is ED use in the week (i.e., 7 days) following the appointment. We ran an earlier version of this intervention (NCT06798389). The current study is modified based on results and clinical guidance. Specifically, more conditions will be included as qualifying ASCs for enrollment. Patients under 30 will be excluded. And rather than calling all patients as in the original study, patient portal users may be contacted via the portal instead of or in addition to a phone call. Finally, in the first study, the intervention was differentially effective by age group (\<45, 45-64, 65+). Our primary analysis will be conducted separately by age group, though we will also conduct an analysis combining across age groups. We will run the study until we reach at least 4,330 patients in each of the following age groups: patients aged 30-45, patients aged 45-64, patients aged 65+. Therefore, our estimated sample size is at least 4,330x3 = 12,990. We may be required to do an interim data pull and/or stop the study early at the direction of clinical or operational leaders.

When admitted to the emergency department (ED), elderly non-autonomous patients show high risk of adverse health outcomes. The prompt identification of ED use risk factors in such population is hence needed. While cognitive impairment is a known clinical risk factor, biomarkers of most prevalent dementias have been scarcely investigated as possible ED use predictors. Within this context, this prospective study aims at exploring whether plasma phospho-tau181 and cerebrovascular burden can predict ED use at 6 months in elderly non-autonomous patients, irrespective of frailty.