REFERRALS TO IRISH-ACCIDENT-AND-EMERGENCY-DEPARTMENTS

A prospective survey of samples of thirty consecutive referrals from g eneral practitioners in fifteen European Countries (the European study of Referrals from Primary Care), found that Irish doctors sent a high er proportion (20.6%) of referrals to Accident and Emergency (A&E) Dep artments than in any other country in the study. Further analysis of t he Irish sample showed that 57% of these patients were referred to spe cialists other than Emergency and Trauma (E&T) (i,e, 12.7% of all refe rrals). These referrals were mostly for acute medical or surgical cond itions requiring inpatient treatment, More non-E&T referrals were sent by doctors closer than 10 km from hospital (26.8% of all their referr als), as compared with doctors 10 km or further from hospital (8.1% of all their referrals), Doctors older than 10 years sent more non-E&T r eferrals to A&E Departments (16.9% of all their referrals) as compared with those aged 40 years or younger (9.6% of all their referrals). In contrast, referrals to Emergency and Trauma specialists were associat ed with greater distance to hospital, as doctors closer than 10 km fro m hospital made only 1.6% of all referrals to the E&T specialty, while doctors 10 km or further from hospital made 12.5% of all referrals to E&T specialists. The author recommends that referrals to non-trauma s pecialists in the Republic of Ireland should go directly to these spec ialists, as in all other countries in Europe, thus freeing Emergency a nd Trauma specialists for their proper Accident and Emergency function .