The boarding of children and adolescents with identified psychiatric conditions at medical facilities has numerous negative effects on the patients and the systems that treat them. Efforts to minimize boarding times serves to increase patients' access to appropriate levels of care, redirect medical resources to patients who need them most, and reduce safety risks to people and property. This study explores the role Clinical Social Workers can play in facilitation of care and highlights the advantages of a coordinated data collection process facilitated by the effective use of the Electronic Medical Record. A retrospective chart analysis of 100 patients admitted to the Emergency department at a pediatric hospital in Central Florida was conducted for patients seen between 1 January 2015 and 30 June 2016. The data suggest key correlates that may impact the boarding times of pediatric patients presenting in a psychiatric crisis and the average duration of boarding time in hours (M = 5.11, SD = 2.07) was found to be significantly lower than prior published studies in the adult and pediatric literature. Discussion of these data implications on behavioral health practice is discussed.
Keywords: Boarding; clinical social work; electronic medical record; psychiatric crisis.