Confused about the hospital system

[albe]

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Could someone explain to me how the hospital system works? What does being "admitted" mean? For example, internists have to admit their patients into the hospital. Does this mean patients can't enter a hospital without going to see their doctor at a clinic first?

I read somewhere that patients in the emergency department have to be admitted into the hospital. Does that make the ED separate from the hospital?

If anyone knows of a link that explains how it all works, that would be really helpful. Thanks!

 

[colbgw02]

i can think of 4 ways to get admitted:

1) you show up in the ER, whether by ambulance or walk-in. the MDs make an assessment and decide you are sick enough to be admitted

2) you show up in clinic. your doctor makes an assessment and decides you are sick enough to be admitted

3) a scheduled admit - like someone with cancer who shows up to have their chemotherapy or someone going to have a scheduled surgery.

4) transfer - an attending physician accepts you as a patient from a hospital somewhere else.

i'm sure there are more, but i think these are the major ones.

 

[Hurricane]

Being admitted means you are assigned a bed and physcian who is on staff at the hospital. To be admitted to a hospital, a physician associciated with that hospital has to decide you need to be there.

So, as you said, an internist can admit his/her patient to a hospital with which he has admitting priveliges. Then your day to day care is either taken care of by that physician, a hospitalist physician, or a team of residents led by an attending physician on staff at the hospital.

If a patient wants to enter a hospital without going to see their docotr at a clinic first, he has to go through the Emergency Room. Once they arrive, they are checked into the ER, given a medical record number and all that, and seen by the physicians in the ER. I guess you could say they are kind of "admitted" to the ER. Then they are either discharged home or admitted as an inpatient. They can't be admitted as an inpatient unless the ER physician thinks they need to be. It's also nice if the physicians on the service to which the patient is being admitted also think the patient needs to be admitted, but that doesn't always happen 😉

 

[8744]

It is all explained on my humble and unassuming blog.