Predictors of Psychiatric Boarding in the Emergency Department

Emergency departments across the U.S. have become a last resort for psychiatric patients in their attempt to seek treatment for their illnesses. In spite of the magnitude of this problem, research on factors that contribute to psychiatric boarding has been very limited. This grant proposal intends to quantify the magnitude of the problem and ascertain the role of demographics, insurance status and disease severity on psychiatric boarding in the emergency department of a large southern California general hospital. Such research will add to the negligible body of knowledge about boarding in southern California and assist in formulating recommendations to reduce boarding among the mentally ill. The dependent variable being examined is boarding while the independent variables are age, insurance status and psychiatric acuity. This study is significant to nursing since psychiatric boarding is occurring in epidemic proportions throughout the U.S.. Because of boarding, care of not only psychiatric patients but also of non-psychiatric patients is compromised and adverse outcomes can occur for both populations.