OEDOC: A Novel, EHR-Based Emergency Department Overcrowding Score

Emergency Department overcrowding is a significant health-care delivery problem that has been linked with increased patient mortality, increased patient length of stay, increased cost, and adverse experiences for patients. As this is a growing issue, there have been various studies conducted to define and measure overcrowding. There are several developed scales for overcrowding, such as NEDOCS, CEDOCS, and EDWIN that act as a good basis for measuring overcrowding but are not universally generalizable across various ED settings. As there have been many updates to modern ED care with increased use of vertical patient care areas, an updated score is needed to accurately represent overcrowding. The score will be used for system patient flow center decisions regarding patient flow and transfer as well as on a facility level with customized EHR based dashboards for surge planning and response.