Emergency Service, Hospital
Conditions
Brief summary
The goal of this campaign is to reduce unnecessary emergency department (ED) visits by encouraging patients with high acuity visits to follow up with an appropriate primary care provider (PCP) or specialist and therefore obtain appropriate care outside of the ED. In this campaign, patients will be assigned to receive or not receive outreach following ED discharge that is aligned with the goal. Outreach will occur via a text message and information added to the patient's after visit summary, and will include a contact number to schedule and hyperlink to allow self-scheduling. The study will assess whether ED use differs across patients in different outreach conditions. It will also examine whether patients followed through on the calls to action in the messages differently across conditions.
Detailed description
Enrollment will conclude when either 7500 participants have been enrolled or after 120 days, whichever occurs first.
Interventions
BEHAVIORALInformation about scheduling a follow-up appointment
Text message(s) will be sent following discharge from the emergency department, along with an after visit summary.
Sponsors
Geisinger Clinic
Study design
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH
Masking
NONE
Masking description
Patients will be aware of their own messages but will not be aware of other messages.
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
18 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
No
Inclusion criteria
* \>= 18 years of age * ED visit rated as high acuity (level L2 or L3) * Discharged from ED in past 24 hours * Attributed to a Geisinger PCP in Community Medicine Service Line
Exclusion criteria
* Have an appointment scheduled within 7 days following discharge with a primary care provider or specialist * Institutionalized * Cannot be contacted via the communication modality being used in the study (i.e., SMS), due to insufficient/missing contact information in the electronic health record or because the patient opted out * Admitted to hospital * Eloped from ED * Left ED without being seen * Deceased prior to messaging
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Return to ED | within 120 days following day of discharge | ED visit (yes/no) |
Other
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| PCP/specialist appointment made | within 7 days following day of discharge | PCP or specialist appointment made |
| PCP/specialist appointment attended | within 7 days following day of discharge | PCP or specialist appointment attended |
Countries
United States
Outcome results
None listed