The longer an elderly patient's emergency department stay is, the more likely they are to develop incident delirium, according to new research from the University of California, Davis.
The research, which was published in the Western Journal of Emergency Medicine, looked at 5,886 patients over 65 years of age, 23 percent of whom reported a history of dementia. What the researchers found was that the longer the stay of these admitted individuals in EDs, the likelihood of developing incident delirium went up.
In total, of the nearly 6,000 patients studied, 24 percent developed incident delirium, researchers reported.
"Prolonged ED length of stay can have detrimental effects on older patients, especially those with a history of dementia and multiple comorbidities," Katren Tyler, MD, vice chair for geriatric emergency medicine and wellness at UC Davis Medical Center and senior author of the study said in a statement.
Three other takeaways from the study:
- Each hour a patient over 65 stayed in the ED, the chance of developing delirium increased by 2 percent.
- Non-clinical patient moves and time in ED hallways were not found to be associated with the development of delirium.
- Of those who did develop incident delirium, men were more likely to be physically restrained by hospital workers rather than receive sedative medications compared to women.