Emergency Department Visit Parent Encounters

Definition

An encounter during which the patient received care in an emergency room setting; operationally defined by the presence of one or more of the following: (1) a qualifying revenue center code value on an institutional claim or bill; (2) a qualifying HCPCS code on an institutional claim or bill; or (3) an EMR encounter record flagged as an ED visit (i.e., Is Encounter Type ED Visit = 1). Includes hospital inpatient admission encounters in which the patient received care in an emergency room setting.

Related Objects

• Emergency Department Visit Parent Encounter Document Aggregator
• Emergency Department Visit Parent Encounters
• Data Mart for Emergency Department Visit Parent Encounters

FAQs

Q: Why describe these encounters as "parent" encounters?
A: It is common for patients receiving care in an emergency room setting to be admitted to observation or inpatient status. That is, for the emergency department visit to be part of a larger encounter involving care outside of the emergency room. Encounters, in our use of the term, may be nested, and the use of the word "parent" is meant to reflect the possibility that there might be other peer encounters -- covering periods of care in observation or inpatient settings -- included under the umbrella of the broader, "parent" encounter.

Q: How do identify the subset of emergency department visit parent encounters that do not involve the patient's progression to observation or inpatient status?
A: Encounters in which the patient progresses to observation or inpatient status can be identified (e.g., for exclusion) using the Is Patient Admitted to Observation and Is Patient Admitted to Hospital Inpatient flags, respectively, which are generated on the Emergency Department Visit Parent Encounters object.

Q: What are the qualifying HCPCS and revenue center code values used to identify care received in an emergency room setting?
A: The qualifying values are contained in the following value sets (which can be accessed in Ursa Studio in the Metadata Manager / Value Sets screen):