A&E audits in conjunction with the college of emergency medicine

The Healthcare Commission has supported the College of Emergency Medicine’s audit programme since 2004, with the Audit Commission supporting the programme before 2004. Four audits were undertaken in 2007 (Moderate/severe asthma in adults, urinary retention, pain in children and fractured neck of femur were undertaken) and the Commission intends to include an indicator based on the CEM audits in its proposals for the 2009-10 Annual Health Check.

For 2008-9 there will be three audits which will cover the period 1 August 2008 to 31 January 2009, with each audit covering at least 50 patients. The subjects are fractured neck of femur, pain in children and paracetamol overdose. The audit tools are Excel spreadsheets and can be downloaded using the following links.

Fractured neck of femur (xls 196kb) (opens new window)

Pain in children (xls 186kb) (opens new window)

Paracetamol overdose (xls 194kb) (opens new window)

You can start these audits as soon as you wish. You should submit your results as soon as you have audited 50 cases, however if there are less than 50 patients who meet the audit criteria you should submit your results by 6 February 2009.

In using the audit tools:

• Save the tools either on your computer or to your network before attempting to enter any data.
• Enable the macros when you open the workbooks you should ensure that macros are enabled. (Some trusts’ computer security systems prevent this, so you may need to contact your IT department.)
• Read the work sheets called ‘read me’ for further guidance before starting
• when you have completed your audit create a summary results file by clicking on the button headed “Click to create summary file” which is found in the sheet titled “Summarised Data”.
• then please e-mail just your summary results file following the instructions in the audit tool. Your results will be included in a feedback report showing how your performance compares with that of other A&E departments.
  Please note that we can only guarantee to provide this feedback if your audit results reach us by 6st February 2009.

If you need further guidance, please contact Philip McMillan at the College (telephone 020 7067 1269 or email philip.mcmillan@collemergencymed.ac.uk ).

The links below will take you to the Emergency Medicine website where you can view a full list of CEM standards.

CEM (opens new window)

College of Emergency Medicine (CEM) Clinical Effectiveness Committee (opens new window)

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