National study of U.S. emergency department visits with diabetic ketoacidosis, 1993-2003.

P atients with diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) are often managed in the emergency department before hospital admission. DKA hospitalizations comprise a significant portion of health care costs for diabetes (1). Although mortality for DKA has fallen, it remains an important cause of diabetes-associated death, especially among younger patients with diabetes (2). Prior analyses of DKA have been single-center intensive care unit (ICU) studies or based on hospital discharges (3–5). Patients may, however, be treated in the emergency department and then admitted to a non-ICU setting or discharged; the frequency of these practices is not known. We sought to describe the epidemiology of emergency department visits with DKA.