The image of hospital emergency rooms as safety nets is being threatened by increasingly stretched resources. But taking a closer look at ways your hospital can expedite the
medical information-gathering process can help to salvage this image.
For the past 10 years, ER visits increased 14% while the number of departments declined 9%, leading to frequent overcrowding, according to a recently released survey from The
American Academy of Emergency Physicians (AAEM).
This situation is being exacerbated by rising federal cutbacks, which makes it more difficult for hospitals to maintain their ER departments, and the escalating number of
uninsured patients that use ER services as their primary healthcare entry point. If improvements aren't made, ER departments will become more vulnerable to making medical
mistakes, says Dr. Tom Scaletta, an AAEM board member. AAEM is calling for the industry to work on rapid solutions.
Harvard Medical School in Boston is tackling this issue by studying how a computer program expedites and streamlines the patient information gathering process in the ER. The
computer program, designed by Dr. Stephen C. Porter, instructor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School, prompts parents to provide answers to 11 basic questions about a child's
medical history. The study was based on 100 parents of children 1 year or younger who visited an ER in a children's hospital. It found that parents were 94% to 98% accurate in
supplying information electronically. Computer programs like these could free up time for ER staff, who often are bogged down by the information gathering process.
(AAEM, Robert McNamara, 215/707-5030)