In 2022, emergency department visits increased 23.9% to nearly 8 million.

Hospital emergency services provided around eight million consultations in 2022, 1.5 million more than in 2021 (+23.9%), according to data from the National Statistics Institute (INE) published this Friday.

Public sector hospitals had 6.6 million consultations in 2022, up 20.1% year-on-year, while private hospitals had 1.5 million, up 43.7%, the highest since 1999, according to INE Health Statistics. published in conjunction with World Health Day, which is celebrated on April 7th.

According to the data, public hospitals or public-private partnership hospitals provided 81.6% of all emergency services (84.2% in 2021 and 95.8% in 1999), and private hospitals provided 18.4% (15.8% in 2020 and 4.2% in 1999).

“The recovery observed in 2022 brings values ​​closer to pre-2020 levels, the year in which hospital emergency volumes fell 30.3% and reached their lowest point in the time series beginning in 1999,” the institute says.

The vast majority of care was provided by general emergency services (71.8%), while pediatrics and obstetrics provided 22.8% and 5.4% of care, respectively.

Pediatric emergency care was the type of emergency care that recorded the largest percentage growth in 2022 (+46.5%) after experiencing the sharpest decline in 2020 (-47.7%).

“In total, 1.8 million consultations were carried out in the pediatric emergency department of Portuguese hospitals in 2022, which is 580.8 thousand more than in the previous year,” he emphasizes.

INE data also shows that there were approximately 1.1 million hospital admissions in 2022, corresponding to 10.2 million hospitalization days.

“After 2020 recorded the lowest numbers in a series dating back to 1999, hospital admissions in 2022 again topped 1 million and hospitalization days topped 10 million, resulting in an additional 29,400 hospital admissions. and 351.8 thousand more days of hospitalization than in 2021 (+2.7% and +3.6%, respectively),” he emphasizes.

In 2022, public or public-private partnership hospitals provided approximately 825 thousand hospitalizations (74.6% of the total) and 7.4 million hospitalization days (72.6% of the total).

There were about 281 thousand hospitalizations in private hospitals (+0.5%), which amounted to 2.8 million days of stay (+1.3%).

Patients remained hospitalized in Portuguese hospitals for an average of 9.2 days, 0.1 days more than in 2021.

When it comes to external medical consultations in hospitals, data shows that about 21.9 million were carried out in 2022, up 3% from 2021.

“This increase in the number of medical consultations carried out in hospital settings has allowed us to surpass the number before the Covid-19 pandemic and reach the highest level since 1999,” emphasizes INE.

Compared to 2021, public hospitals or public-private partnership hospitals conducted 148.4 thousand more consultations (+1.1%), providing 62% of the total (84.4% in 1999).

Private hospitals carried out more than 488.9 thousand consultations (+6.2%), representing 38% of the total (15.6% in 1999), he says, emphasizing that “this is an aspect of care in which private hospitals have succeeded achieve the highest percentage among all.”

The specialties with the highest number of medical consultations in public hospitals or through public-private partnerships in 2022, in descending order, were ophthalmology, orthopedics, gynecology-obstetrics, general surgery, and pediatrics.

In private hospitals these were the departments of orthopedics, ophthalmology, gynecology-obstetrics, physical and rehabilitation medicine and otolaryngology.

Private hospitals contributed the most to the increase in activity in these specialties: they accounted for 76.3% of the increase in orthopedic consultations, 83.9% of otolaryngology consultations and 70.7% of pulmonology consultations.