Emergency physicians have long taken pride in delivering care every day of the week, every hour of the day. ACEP’s Emergency Department Accreditation program adds a layer to that, says Marianne Gausche-Hill, MD, FACEP, FAAP, FAEM, Chair of the program’s Board of Governors.

“High quality care for anyone, any age, any condition—that’s what this program will work to ensure,” says Dr. Gausche-Hill, an emergency physician and Interim CEO of the Lundquist Institute at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center. “We understand there are large community hospitals, academic centers and rural hospitals with vastly different resources and needs. However, when a patient walks through the door, they want to know there are resources available for that ED to delivery high quality care.”

ACEP’s ED Accreditation Program (EDAP) is the next step in ACEP’s robust suite of Accreditation programs.

ACEP’s Clinical Ultrasound Accreditation Program (CUAP) strives for continuous quality management and patient safety, communication, responsibility, and clarity regarding the use of clinical ultrasound. Accreditation ensures that safe, quality examinations are performed in any ED that utilizes clinical, point-of-care ultrasound.

ACEP’s Geriatric Emergency Department Accreditation Program (GEDA) promotes the best clinical practices for older adults. In August, GEDA’s work was validated when the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services introduced an Age-Friendly Hospital Measure as part of the fiscal year 2025 Inpatient Prospective Payment System rule. This measure incorporates important aspects of the GEDA framework into care delivery.

Finally, ACEP’s Pain and Addiction Care in the ED Program (PACED) works to accelerate the transfer of knowledge about acute pain management and secure appropriate resources to care for patients. A June CDC report found that, although medications for opioid use disorder substantially reduce mortality, they are underused. In 2022, only 25 percent of the patients needing OUD treatment received it, according to the report.

Dr. Gausche-Hill says the success of these programs sends a clear message that rigorous and adaptive quality standards are paramount, and therefore, EDAP is a logical next step in ACEP’s pursuit of enhanced patient care, transparency and support for frontline workers. Because overall accreditation is so broad, however, she says the work it takes to launch such a program is nothing short of enormous.

EDAP has been more than a year in the making, and launch is expected around Spring 2025.

“It’s a pretty daunting task when you think about it,” says Dr. Gausche-Hill. “That’s because emergency departments include a number of emergency clinicians led by emergency physicians.” We want to make the environment not only safe for our patients but also for all our frontline workers—emergency physicians, physician assistants, nurse practitioners, everybody. It has taken a lot of collaboration to reach this point.”

The core of the EDAP is to establish a set of criteria EDs must meet to achieve accreditation.

The criteria will encompass staffing levels, quality improvement plans, and transfer policies. This comprehensive approach ensures that EDs are not only prepared to provide immediate care but also equipped to manage more complex cases through effective transfer protocols.

One of the significant advantages of EDAP is its potential to enhance transparency. Patients often face uncertainty about the qualifications of the medical staff treating them. In keeping with ACEP’s official stance in support of physician-led teams, part of EDAP criteria will include information about the hospital’s inclusion of board-certified emergency physicians.

“We work collaboratively with the entire emergency medicine team to leverage training and resources to efficiently, rapidly and comprehensively take care of patients within an emergency department setting,” says Dr. Guasche-Hill. “Who better than emergency physicians to lead that? You want to know when you need care that there’s somebody trained and ready for whatever is presented. But what this program does is ensure that the hospital is also committed to ongoing training and improvement.”

Four levels of ED Accreditation will be available—Level 1, Level 2, Level 3 and Rural. Hospitals must meet standards based on staffing, physician contracting, quality, policies and resources. These domains are driven by ACEP policies.

ACEP has launched its pilot phase of the program. Five hospitals have enrolled as pilot sites and have agreed to provide criteria and process feedback to the ED Accreditation Board of Governors. This feedback will be instrumental towards a successful nationwide program launch, says Dr. Gausche-Hill.

Pilot participants include:

• The University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB), Alabama, teaching hospital
• University of Maryland Medical Center, Maryland, teaching hospital
• John Peter Smith Hospital (JPS), Texas, Safety Net hospital
• Holy Cross Medical Center, New Mexico, Critical Access hospital
• Novant Health Forsyth Medical Center

One of the distinguishing features of the EDAP is its commitment to being responsive.

The accreditation criteria will evolve based on feedback, best practices, and emerging trends in emergency medicine. Gausche-Hill says that the program you see at launch in 2025 probably will change based on feedback in 2026.

“The key is thoughtfulness, inclusiveness, and understanding that this is dynamic,” she said. “The GEDA Program isn’t the same as it was when it was launched, and that’s good. We want to adjust over time based on changes within emergency medicine guidelines. We’re excited about it. We know this is a program emergency physicians should lead, working with partners, but ensuring that physicians lead the creation of the criteria.”