Are adults in need of support and protection being identified in emergency departments

Purpose – Frequent attendance at emergency departments (ED) has been identified in adult protection reviews as a potential warning sign of the escalation of someone’s vulnerability. Concern has been expressed about the engagement of the National Health Service (NHS) in adult protection and the small number of NHS adult protection referrals. More specifically ED departments have been identified as an area of high patient through put where there has been little evidence around how well adult support and protection (ASP) was being delivered. The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach – A series of audits were undertaken in three different hospitals across a large Scottish Health Board accessing ED at different times of day on different days of the week to test out whether NHS staff working in EDs are identifying adults who meet the criteria of “an adult at risk”. Findings – The audits identified a total of 11 patients from a total sample of 552 records examined who may have met the c...