Objectives: The medical utilization rates (MUR) can be applied to anticipate necessary medical resources at mass gatherings. The MUR describes the number of patients per thousand attendees. The aim of this observational study was to evaluate whether the type of music festival, Electronic Dance Music Festivals (EDMF) versus Mainstream, is related to the MUR and to drug-related incidents.
Methods: We conducted a retrospective analysis of patient data from Event Medical Service B.V., a Dutch company, providing emergency care at many festivals in the Netherlands. Data were collected in an online database between February 2022 and August 2023. The number of patient contacts per festival type was recorded and patients requiring advanced medical care (unable to sit, potentially hemodynamically unstable, and/or requiring advanced medical care), were analyzed for drug-related causes.
Results: A total of 20,829 patients presented at 518 events with a total attendance of almost 7.5 million visitors. There were 253 EDMF events with a median attendance of 12,000 and 265 mainstream events with a median attendance of 10,000 per event. The average MUR for the EDMF group was higher compared to the Mainstream group (28.8 vs. 17.8, p < 0.001). A total of 1,732 patients needed advanced medical care. The proportion of drug-related cases among the patients needing advanced medical care, mainly stimulants and combined drug use, was 74% for the EDMF group compared to 52% in the mainstream group (p < 0.001).
Conclusions: In this observational study we found a clear difference in MUR in Electronic Dance Music events compared to Mainstream events with a higher percentage of drug-related cases in patients with more severe conditions at EDMF events. Our findings may help to better plan scarce medical resources at mass gatherings in the music scene and suggest that EDMF need a targeted approach for more drug-related pathology.