The association between deprivation levels, attendance rate and triage category of children attending a children's accident and emergency department

Abstract

Objective - To determine the relation between deprivation category, triage score and accident and and emergency (A&E) attendance for children under the age of 13. Design - Retrospective study of all children attending an A&E department over one year. Setting - A paediatric teaching hospital in Edinburgh. Subjects - All children attending the A&E department who had a postcode and a triage score documented on attendance. The postcode was used to determine the deprivation category and the triage scored the severity of illness or injury. Main outcome measure - The relation between deprivation category, triage score and frequency of attendance. Results - There is a trend toward increased attendance in all triage categories for deprivation categories 6 and 7. Conclusions - Attendance at A&E is not only related to severity of injury but also to deprivation category. The reason why people from disadvantage areas attend more frequently needs further evaluation.