Anatomy of a demand shock: Quantitative analysis of crowding in hospital emergency departments in Victoria, Australia during the 2009 influenza pandemic

Abstract

This pandemic event caused excess demand leading to increased waiting times, did-not-wait patients and access block. Increases in admitted patients were more strongly associated with crowding than non-admitted patients during the pandemic period, so policies to divert or mitigate low-complexity non-admitted patients are unlikely to be effective in reducing ED crowding.