부산대학교 도서관

Introduction: Diverticulitis is a common diagnosis in the emergency department (ED). Outpatient management of diverticulitis is safe in selected patients, yet the rates of admission and surgical procedures following ED visits for diverticulitis are unknown, as are the predictive patient characteristics. Our goal is to describe trends in admission and surgical procedures following ED visits for diverticulitis, and to determine which patient characteristics predict admission.Methods: We performed a cross-sectional descriptive analysis using data on ED visits from 2006-2011 to determine change in admission and surgical patterns over time. The Nationwide Emergency DepartmentSample database, a nationally representative administrative claims dataset, was used to analyze ED visits for diverticulitis. We included patients with a principal diagnosis of diverticulitis (ICD-9 codes562.11, 562.13). We analyzed the rate of admission and surgery in all admitted patients and in low-risk patients, defined as age