Overcrowding in the emergency department (ED) has become an increasingly significant worldwide public health problem in the last decade. It is a consequence of simultaneous increasing demand for health care and a deficit in available hospital beds and ED beds, as for example it occurs in mass casualty incidents, but also in other conditions causing a shortage of hospital beds. In Italy in the l...

All correctional services face the challenge of ‘doing more with less’. Doing more means that they are expected not only to ‘house’ prisoners in a safe and secure environment but also to deliver rehabilitative programmes and to prepare prisoners for release. Importantly, they must also meet the growing expectations of external accountability agencies including human rights organizations. Doing ...

OBJECTIVE The aims of this study were to describe overcrowding in regional emergency departments in Seoul, Korea and evaluate the effect of crowdedness on ambulance turnaround time. METHODS This study was conducted between January 2010 and December 2010. Patients who were transported by 119-responding ambulances to 28 emergency centers within Seoul were eligible for enrollment. Overcrowding w...

A mental hospital responsible for psychiatric illness occurring in a population of 500,000 may have 2,000 inpatients (four beds for 1,000 of the population at risk). There will be a further 8,000 people needing regular psychiatric treatment. It is neither necessary nor desirable that everyone of the 10,000 patients should be in hospital. Not necessary because many people with psychiatric illnes...

Two recent articles and one official document have drawn attention to the problem and impl icat ions of overcrowding in state hospitals , especial ly the issues related to floor patients (1,2,3). The proposals to counter overcrowding include those based on the reasons for overcrowding at tertiary care level , bypassing of other levels of care, lack of an effective referral system, and the incre...

Despite advances in methods of detection and pharmacological therapies, the global burden of tuberculosis (TB) remains staggeringly high, with approximately one third of the world’s population estimated to be infected with the mycobacterium that causes TB.1 The explosive epidemic of TB has been particularly acute in the correctional institutions of the Russian Federation, where extraordinary le...

The world's population crisis has become a very fashionable topic yet everyone remains in the dark about the way overcrowding will modify and radically change our way of life. Preparatory research is needed now.

INTRODUCTION Emergency department (ED) crowding is a significant problem in Canada and has been associated with decreased quality of care in general and pediatric emergency departments (PEDs). Although boarding of admitted patients in the ED is the main contributor to adult ED overcrowding, factors involved in PED crowding may be different. The objective of this study was to report the trend in...