Background: Despite system-level focus on avoidance of potentially preventable hospitalizations, the decision to admit a patient with low medical acuity has been understudied. Our study sought to identify factors associated with admission versus discharge from the Emergency Department (ED) for patients considered unlikely to be medically appropriate for admission. Methods: We conducted a retrospective cross-sectional [...]

Background: Hospitalists have increasingly engaged in admission decision-making for acute care medical patients. The role, duties, and impact of a Hospital Medicine Triage Attending (“triagist”) are emerging yet ill-defined. To our knowledge, no study thus far has catalogued the activities of these physicians in a comprehensive way. Our objectives were to 1) characterize the demands [...]

Background: A growing area within medical literature focuses on clinical prediction and decision tools that use variables from patient history, examination, or diagnostic tests to generate outcome-based risk stratification and/or intervention recommendations. Demonstration of appropriate methodologic quality and clinical applicability remains a need. Here we explore tools that advise a complicated, multifaceted phenomenon – the [...]