The Role and Impact of Same Day Emergency Care
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Reducing Avoidable Admissions in Acute Hospital Care: The role and impact of Same Day Emergency Care Services
IRAS ID
340043
Contact name
Richard Jacques
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Sheffield
Duration of Study in the UK
2 years, 5 months, 30 days
Research summary
Our hospitals are getting busier and busier leading to long waits in A&E departments for assessment and for a hospital bed. This leads to difficulties for hospitals and staff in delivering good patient care, and can cause delays in ambulance response and handovers. These problems can have a serious impact on safety of care and long term health.
Many patients who are admitted to hospital via A&E departments end up only staying less than 24 hours and then being discharged. Some patients who are admitted to hospital can have safe care and better outcomes if they are treated without staying overnight. This can often lead to better experiences, reduced complications and reduced costs for the NHS. Same Day Emergency Care Services (SDEC) were developed by the NHS to provide safe care without an overnight stay for this group of patients.
SDEC services provide rapid assessment, diagnosis and treatment for a wide range of urgent conditions. However, there are a lot of differences in how these services are run across the country. At present we do not know what effect these services are having on patients, hospital admissions or A&E performance. We also do not know what staff and patients’ experiences of SDEC services are. Our study is designed to understand what effect Same Day Emergency Care Services are having on patient care and hospitals nationally. The study has a number of stages. In the stage we are planning now, we will look at 6-8 case studies in different hospitals with different types of SDEC. Researchers will spend time at each location observing in the SDEC and will interview staff, patients and carers about their experiences to understand how things are working in practice.
REC name
Wales REC 6
REC reference
25/WA/0350
Date of REC Opinion
27 Nov 2025
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion