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Anxiety and alcohol in the working‐age population are driving a rise in mental health‐related emergency department presentations: 15 year trends in emergency department presentations in Western Australia
Author(s) -
Yap Matthew,
Tuson Matthew,
Whyatt David,
Vickery Alistair
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
emergency medicine australasia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.602
H-Index - 52
eISSN - 1742-6723
pISSN - 1742-6731
DOI - 10.1111/1742-6723.13342
Subject(s) - medicine , emergency department , mental health , anxiety , population , occupational safety and health , gerontology , demography , psychiatry , environmental health , sociology , pathology
Objective To evaluate age, gender and disease‐specific trends in ED for mental health presentations over 15 years. Methods The study population consisted of residents of metropolitan Perth, Western Australia, presenting to Perth ED between 1 July 2002 and 30 June 2017. Population rates of mental health‐related ED presentations per year were calculated. Results Rates of mental health ED presentations are significantly increasing in the working‐age population for those with stress and anxiety‐related diagnoses, particularly in younger females, and also for alcohol‐related presentations for those aged 10–49 years, particularly in males. Conclusion The present study demonstrates that increased rates of mental health‐related ED presentations are driven by increased rates of presentation for stress and anxiety‐related and alcohol‐related presentations in both genders across the working‐age population.