Waiting in the ED

The average time people wait in the Emergency Department (ED) is 4 hours and 5 minutes. This is a slight increase over last year (2007), according to a recent report from Press Ganey, a leader in the field of surveying and measuring all aspects of healthcare quality.

Not only has the average wait-time increased, but this has been accompanied by a rise in the number of patients expressing dissatisfaction with the services. However, analysis showed that the rate of dissatisfaction was lower in those departments where there was a conscious effort to communicate with patients about the reasons for delay. To address this, one hospital created the position of “ED Hostess.” The responsibility of the ED Hostess was to greet patients and families and keep them informed of delays during their time in the ED. This resulted in an average 7.7 improvement in the hospital’s ED satisfaction score over a 2-year period. (The average USA overall satisfaction score, based on 1.5 million patients, was 81.3.) Maybe other hospitals could follow this example, using an unpaid volunteer, possibly a hospital Auxilian.

The National Health Service (NHS) in the UK has a referral phone service – NHS Direct – which handles over 22,000 calls a day. It can also be accessed via the Internet or interactive TV services. A survey conducted during a 2-week period showed that 41% of callers were advised to treat themselves at home, 11% were referred to a hospital ED, and 28% to their family physician. A few referrals were to dentists or pharmacists. Nearly 75% of callers reported that they would have gone either to their family physician or the ED if they hadn’t been able to phone the service. So here’s another way to reduce the burgeoning load on EDs. Perhaps this approach will become an option with reform of US healthcare in the next decade.

In the meantime, may your next visit to the ED be as painless and as short as you hope. Remember that it’s highly likely there are other patients who are worse off than you.