Snapshot of emergency departments in Jakarta, Indonesia

EDs in Indonesia face an unprecedented increase in patient influx after the expansion of national health insurance system coverage. The present study aims to describe EDs' characteristics and capabilities utilisation in Jakarta.

An ED inventory was created from the Jakarta Provincial Health Office and the Indonesian Hospital Association registries. The EDs that were accessible to the general public 24/7 were surveyed about their characteristics during the calendar year 2017. For further ED analysis, we stratified the hospitals into four types (A, B, C and D) based on their size and capabilities, with type A being the largest.

From the 118 (81%) out of 146 EDs that responded, there were 2 million ED visits or 202 per 1000 people. The median annual visit volume was 11 200 (interquartile range 4233-18 000). Further stratification highlights the annual visit difference among hospital types where type A hospitals reported the most with 32 000 (interquartile range 13 459-38 873). Almost half of the EDs (47%) answered that ≥60% of the inpatient census came from the ED. Less than half of the EDs (44%) can manage psychiatry, oral-maxillofacial and plastic surgery cases. Consultant coverage varied across hospitals and by hospital type (P < 0.05), except for general surgery and obstetrics and gynaecology consultants who were available in most hospitals (74%).

Physicians with limited experience and EDs with heterogeneous emergency care capabilities likely threatened the consistency of quality emergency care, particularly for time-sensitive conditions. Our study provides a benchmark for future improvements in emergency care.