Patient pathways in emergency care settings for people presenting with issues and/or conditions relating to alcohol and/or substance use A scoping review protocol summary

A scoping review following the framework suggested by Arksey and O’Malley (2005) will be used to gather information on patient pathways for people who present to NHS emergency services (e.g., ambulance, accident and emergency departments/minor injuries units, out of hours services, mental health related crisis or liaison teams) with conditions or issues relating to substance and/or alcohol use. A scoping study aims to address a broad topic and retrieve relevant information from publications varying in design and context, rather than answering a specific well-defined question as would be expected with a systematic review (Arksey and O’Malley, 2005). This design was deemed as appropriate in order to gather information that had been published on patient pathways for substance and/or alcohol related issues. The scoping review aims to summarise information on what is known, draw conclusions and make recommendations based on the information retrieved. However, quality assessment of the publications is not within the remit of this type of review (Arksey and O’Malley, 2005). The information and outcome of this scoping review will be utilised to recommend patient pathways that can be implemented in emergency ambulance care, acute hospital accident and emergency departments, and mental health NHS Trust settings. This will inform the submission of a research bid for a feasibility study to test the patient pathway(s). The results from this scoping review will be written for publication.