{"pk":14710,"title":"Impact of a Novel Emergency Department Forward Treatment Area During the New York City COVID-19 Surge","subtitle":null,"abstract":"Introduction:\n Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused a disproportionate number of patients to seek emergency care at hospitals in New York City (NYC) during the initial crisis. Our urban emergency department (ED), a member of the NYC public hospital system had to process the increased volume while also differentiating our patients’ critical needs. We established a forward treatment area (FTA) directly in front of the ED to accomplish these goals from March 23–April 16, 2020.\nMethods:\n A clinical greeter evaluated patients 18 years and older who presented to the walk-in entrance of the ED where they were screened for COVID-19-like complaints. If they did not appear critically ill and could ambulate they were directed into the FTA. Clinical and non-clinical staff worked in concert to register, evaluate, and process patients with either a disposition of directly home or into the ED for further care.\nResults:\n A total of 634 patients were seen in the FTA from March 23–April 16, 2020. Of the 634 patients evaluated, 135 (21%) were referred into the ED for further evaluation, of whom 81 (12.7% of the total) were admitted. These patients were disproportionately male (91 into the ED and 63 admitted) and tended to have a higher heart rate (105.4 vs 93.7), a higher respiratory rate (21.5 vs 18.1), and lower oxygen saturation (93.9% vs 97.8%).\nConclusion:\n A forward treatment area is an effective method to rapidly screen and process an increased volume of COVID-19 patients when resources are limited. This treatment area helped decompress the ED by being rapidly deployable and effectively screening patients for safe discharge home.","language":"en","license":{"name":"Creative Commons Attribution 4.0","short_name":"CC BY 4.0","text":"Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.\r\n\r\nNo additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0"},"keywords":[{"word":"Forward Treatment Area, COVID-19, Surge, NYC, New York City, Pandemic, Mass Influx, Operations, Emergency Planning"}],"section":"Emergency Department Operations","is_remote":true,"remote_url":"https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0z38f2xt","frozenauthors":[{"first_name":"Joshua","middle_name":"Brett","last_name":"Moskovitz","name_suffix":"","institution":"Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Department of Emergency Medicine, Bronx, New York; Hofstra School of Health and Human Services, Department of Public Health,  Hempstead, New York","department":"None"},{"first_name":"Kaushal","middle_name":"","last_name":"Khambathi","name_suffix":"","institution":"Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Jacobi Montefiore Emergency Medicine Residency, Bronx, New York","department":"None"},{"first_name":"Comilla","middle_name":"","last_name":"Sasson","name_suffix":"","institution":"American Heart Association, Dallas, Texas","department":"None"},{"first_name":"Jason","middle_name":"","last_name":"D’Amore","name_suffix":"","institution":"Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Department of Emergency Medicine, Bronx, New York","department":"None"},{"first_name":"Michael","middle_name":"P.","last_name":"Jones","name_suffix":"","institution":"Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Department of Emergency Medicine, Bronx, New York","department":"None"},{"first_name":"Jeremy","middle_name":"","last_name":"Sperling","name_suffix":"","institution":"Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Department of Emergency Medicine, Bronx, New York","department":"None"}],"date_submitted":"2020-11-02T19:19:45Z","date_accepted":"2020-11-02T19:19:45Z","date_published":"2021-07-14T22:52:13Z","render_galley":null,"galleys":[{"label":"","type":"pdf","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/westjem/article/14710/galley/7491/download/"}]}