1. There are correlations between wait times, patient satisfaction and hospital profitability. It's easy to connect the dots between an ED wait time and a hospital's bottom line: Studies have reflected a positive correlation between patient satisfaction and low wait times, and patient satisfaction is a ticket to profitability for hospitals. "Fast care leads to happier patients who are more likely to use that hospital," says Steven B. Kailes, MD, a board-certified emergency medicine physician with Titan Emergency Group. In 2009, patients waited for an average of four hours and seven minutes in hospital EDs, according to a Press Ganey study, and patients who spent more than two hours in the ED reported less overall satisfaction with their visits than those who are there less than two hours.
2. EDs have a different role than they used to within the hospital system. ED volumes increase every year, according to Dr. Kailes, since they provide convenient and quicker care than many primary care physicians whose appointment schedules are booked up months at a time. "One in every three of us will go to the ED this year," he says. There was a time when the ED was just a room, then a department, and is now on its way to taking on a more prominent role within hospitals as patients visit more each year combined with increased patient volume due to healthcare reform. For EDs to operate as a cost-effective component of the system, hospitals must transform and offer more emergency care and consider ED expansion.
3. More hospitals are allowing patients to make non-emergency appointments online. While many patients may not plan emergency visits ahead of time, people with non-life threatening illnesses or injuries can make appointments online through programs such as InQuickER. The system, which has been gaining steam, charges a fee of $15 to $25, which is then added to the other costs of the ED visit. Patients who register online are guaranteed to be seen within 15 minutes or they get their money back. Physicians who support appointments say the system improves patient satisfaction and could decrease hospital-acquired infections, which can spread easily in the waiting room.
4. Closely define, measure and communicate ED metrics. Some hospitals conduct daily, detailed reports on ED metrics, tracking how long patients wait on-average before being greeted, for instance. Other points of measurement extend beyond the emergency department, such as how long it takes for X-Rays, lab results, or tests to be ordered, returned and communicated to the patient. This helps providers in the ED understand where they fall within patients' continuum of care, and also helps them realize the weak spots that may be outside their department. "You want to be efficient," says Dr. Kailes. "These metrics are helpful to know since, as an emergency physician, a lot of your care is out of my control."
5. More hospitals are making calculated decisions to draw patients to their EDs. As part of recent trends, more hospital EDs are advertising or displaying wait times. These times convey more information than the number of minutes you sit in a chair, however — it can say multitudes about the patient experience your hospital offers as well as its financial standing, serving as an effective marketing tool. Some hospitals have posted this information on billboards while others relay it on their websites and others convey it through text messages. For hospitals with competitors, such efforts to distinguish one ED from another can really pay off when vying for patients.
About Dr. Kailes
Dr. Steven B. Kailes is a board-certified emergency medicine physician and partner with Titan Emergency Group. He practices out of Jacksonville, Fla., where he staffs the ED at Orange Park Medical Center.
Learn more about Titan Emergency Group.
Read more about hospital EDs:
- Study Suggests Academic ED Physicians Spend Majority of Time in Indirect Care Activities
- Michigan's Saint Joseph Mercy Designs EDs for Senior Citizens