The study, published in the journal Academic Emergency Medicine, examined data for 1,419 patients who went to an ED between March 1 and May 28 in the Philadelphia area. The patients were discharged, and they tested positive for COVID-19 in the seven days before or after the ED visit.
Researchers found 8.6 percent of patients came back to the hospital after their first ED visit, with 4.7 percent being admitted to the hospital within three days of their initial ED visit, and 3.9 percent being hospitalized within one week.
“We were surprised with the overall rate that patients return and need admission, which is twice that of other illnesses,” said Austin Kilaru, MD, study lead author and an emergency medicine physician at Philadelphia-based Penn Medicine. “The concern is not that emergency physicians are making wrong decisions, but rather that COVID can be unpredictable and turn severe rather quickly.”
Researchers found that patients with low pulse oximetry readings were about four times as likely to need hospitalization after returning to the hospital, compared to those with higher readings, and patients with fevers were more than three times as likely to be hospitalized versus those without fevers.
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