Acute Medicine: triage, timing and teaching in the context of medical emergency admissions.

Acute Medicine has been recognized as a sub-specialty of General Internal Medicine in the UK for 6 years. Acute Medicine aims to streamline diagnostic processes and treatment decisions for patients presenting with an acute illness in Internal Medicine in order to improve safety, patient experience and resource utilization. Acute Physicians are specialists in Acute Medicine. Co-location of patients in Acute Medical Units helps to rationalize logistical processes and supports training of junior doctors in supervised management of both life-threatening and complex medical emergencies. Research is needed to formally evaluate the impact of the format of service delivery on clinical outcomes and length of hospital stay for patients with comparable sickness profiles.