Syndromic surveillance of health care data such as the International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision (ICD-9), codes related to Influenza-Like-Illness (ILI), was used to track the progression of the 2009 Fall Novel H1N1 Outbreak in the Madison area. Early studies focused on prediction of an outbreak, however further investigation of patient resource utilization would be helpful in developing an action plan for addressing community and patient needs during future outbreaks. There is a paucity of research comparing emergency department (ED) and urgent care utilization rates during the 2009 Novel H1N1 Pandemic, though there is regional data suggesting that urgent care centers bore a larger portion of the burden of H1N1 influenza than emergency departments. Furthermore, one group found that ILI related phone calls to urgent care centers predicted influenza outbreak at least one week ahead of peaks in the ILI hospital care consultation rates. ED data on its own has proven useful for public health disease surveillance and many studies group urgent care and ED care together. The literature is lacking subgroup analysis of these two very different care environments. Understanding the correlation between urgent care and ED utilization rates will provide a more in depth understanding of the stress that the 2009 Fall Novel H1N1 placed on community resources in our geographic region.
Objective
To compare the proportion of patients presenting with ILI to urgent care centers versus the ED during the 2009 Fall Novel H1N1 Outbreak.