ABSTRACT

During the COVID-19 epidemic, emergency departments played an important role in identifying patients, isolating, preventing in-hospital infections, and informing public health authorities. It is necessary to identify the possible patients quickly and isolate them from others.

It was necessary to reorganize the emergency departments, which will be the first place of admission for the majority of patients. Emergency patient care should continue in emergency departments even in disasters, and in many countries, emergency departments operate at maximum capacity in their normal routines. For all these reasons, policies are required to prevent crowding in health centers and to control them, especially identify patients in the emergency departments, before hospital admission if possible.

In this study, we explain how an emergency department of a university hospital was organized during the COVID-19 pandemic, and the organization of care of infected patients, other emergency patients, and forensic cases who admitted to the emergency department.

Keywords: COVID-19, Pandemic, Emergency Department, Organization, Emergency patient, Forensic case