Associated Press Stacom, Don
“Friday Night at the ER” provided department heads, managers and staff with an in-depth look at staffing levels, revenues and hospital administration after simulating a 24-hour period at Bristol Hospital in Connecticut. The program is based on a board game and divided staff into groups of four charged with managing growing numbers of patients and shortages of beds and nurses. The number of patients in the ER waiting room continued to increase during the game, and teams managing the operating room, critical care unit, medical surgical floor and the ER discovered that when they worked together the number of patients in the waiting room declined.
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That is a pretty cool way to learn the best strategies for teamwork and patient care in a controlled environment. Thanks for the post, I will have to check it out.
The issue of ED overcrowding is truly a hospital wide issue. In assisting a variety of clients to improve ED performance, I have found that about 75% of the issues that adversely impact patient throughput are resident outside the control of ED management.
Slow diagnostic turnaround, lack of inpatient beds, inpatient nurse shortages, inefficient patient flow management systems and processes, and ineffective caregiver communication technologies and processes are all examples of issues that constrain the ED’s ability to provide efficient high quality care.
For more information on techniques to improve ED throughput, please see the Emergency Department performance improvement case study on my website.