Background: This study used the National Emergency Department Information System (NEDIS) data to analyze the flow of emergency and critical emergency patients and to identify the patterns of emergency medical service usage in Korea. Methods: The relevance index (RI) and commitment index (CI) were calculated from the 2016 NEDIS data. In this study, the number of clusters was determined using NbClust, and cluster analysis was used to analyze the usage patterns of emergency and critical emergency patients. Results: The RI and CI were calculated using 8,389,766 cases of 214 districts. The results of the RI and CI suggested that there were 3 types of clusters among the emergency patients. In Cluster 1, 54 districts (25.2%) had low RI and high CI, and it was of outflow type. Cluster 2 was categorized as the influx-type in 58 districts (27.1%) irrespective of RI and low CI. Cluster 3 was categorized as the self-sufficient type found in 102 districts (47.7%), with high RI and high CI. The cluster analysis of the critical emergency patients was divided into 2 types. Cluster 1 was categorized as outflow type with high CI found in 129 districts (60.3%), while Cluster 2 was categorized as inflow type with low CI found in 85 districts (39.7%). Conclusions: This study elucidates the regional status of usage patterns of emergency and critical emergency patients in Korea. This study might serve as a basis for the establishment and selection of emergency medical service areas and vulnerable emergency medical service areas.

(1) Background: The government of South Korea has established a nationwide web- and mobile-based emergency teleconsultation network by designating urban and rural hospitals. The purpose of this study is to analyze the characteristics and effectiveness of the tele-emergency system in South Korea. (2) Methods: Tele-emergency consultation cases from May 2015 to December 2018 were analyzed in the present study. The definition of a tele-emergency in the present study is an emergency consultation between doctors in rural and urban hospitals via a web- and mobile-based remote emergency consultation system (RECS). Consultations through an RECS are grouped into three categories: medical procedure or treatment guidance, image interpretation, and transportation requests. The present study analyzed the characteristics of the tele-emergency system and the reduction in unnecessary transportation (RUT). (3) Results: A total of 2604 cases were analyzed in the present study from 2985 tele-emergency consultation cases. A total of 381 cases were excluded for missing data. Consultations for image interpretation were the most common in trauma cases (71.3%), while transfer requests were the most common in non-trauma cases (50.3%). Trauma patients were more frequently admitted to rural hospitals or discharged and followed up with at rural hospitals (20.3% vs. 40.5%) after consultations. In terms of disease severity, non-severe cases were statistically higher in trauma cases (80.6% vs. 59.4%; p < 0.001). The RUT was statistically highly associated with trauma cases (60.8% vs. 42.8%; p < 0.001). In an analysis that categorized cases by region, a statistically higher proportion of transportation was used in island regions (69.9% vs. 49.5%; p < 0.003). More RUT was associated with non-island regions (30.1% vs. 50.5%; p = 0.001). (4) Conclusions: The tele-emergency system had a great role in reducing unnecessary patient transportation in non-severe trauma cases and non-island rural area emergency cases. Further research is needed for a cost/benefit analysis and clinical outcomes.