[Four years of pediatric emergencies. Relationship between the increase in their number and personal initiatives in complementary examinations as well as hospital admissions].

In 16,848 paediatric emergencies taken care of from 1986 to 1989 in a regional hospital which had started work in 1985, we have confirmed an initial increase of over 20& per year in the number of paediatric emergencies that have become stable as we have reached full coverage of the total paediatric population in area. We have also stated that the volume of personal initiative emergencies has been increasing rather meaningluffly every year, going up from an initial 55% to a 75% in four years. On opposite the number of complementary checkups has decreased significantly from 38% to 35% and children hospital entries including those that required urgency observation have also gone down from a 21,69 in 1986 to a 15,8 in 1989. The growing tendency to overuse paediatric emergencies indiscriminately on the part of the population, leads us to make a serious proposal towards the adaptation and suitabilisation of emergency service in hospitals in order to be prepared to deal with non-urgent pathology.