How should nonspecific complaints be defined? Comment to: “nonspecific complaints (NSCs) in the emergency department”

Emergency department utilization and presenting chief complaints by Veterans living with dementia

“…These findings are congruent with a prior study conducted in a smaller population of Medicare beneficiaries in two health systems comparing ED visits before and after a diagnosis of dementia 16 . While there is no standardized definition of nonspecific complaints, they are generally considered to be presentations that do not suggest an ED evaluation based on any particular organ system or infectious etiology—essentially, they are defined by the lack of a specific complaint 34 . We note that for other nonspecific complaints such as dizziness or pain, rates among the two groups appear similar or have even higher rates in the nondementia cohort.…”

“…16 While there is no standardized definition of nonspecific complaints, they are generally considered to be presentations that do not suggest an ED evaluation based on any particular organ system or infectious etiologyessentially, they are defined by the lack of a specific complaint. 34 We note that for other nonspecific complaints such as dizziness or pain, rates among the two groups appear similar or have even higher rates in the nondementia cohort. When examining associated encounter diagnoses assigned to these common chief complaints, we found they were largely similar between the two groups but spanned a wide range of clinical conditions within each chief complaint category (e.g., the chief complaint of falls could be associated with traumatic or medical etiologies based on encounter diagnosis).…”

A common definition should be used in future studies of NSC

“…A common definition should be used in future studies of NSC Kirsi Kemp 1* , Reija Mertanen 1 , Leila Niemi-Murola 2 , Lasse Lehtonen 3 and Maaret Castrén 1 Dear Editor,…”

“…We have read with great interest a recent commentary, "How should nonspecific complaints be defined? Comment to: "nonspecific complaints (NSCs) in the emergency department" [1] concerning our systematic review [2].…”