Over the past year, Geisinger Health System has refunded dissatisfied patients’ out-of-pocket costs—which has helped system leaders hone in on one particular area of irritation: wait times, writes President and CEO David Feinberg in a post on LinkedIn.
The program has helped improve the system’s patient satisfaction scores, according to Feinberg. Further, it has allowed hospital leaders to see exactly what frustrates patients—and wait times consistently tops the list, he said.
To fix it, Feinberg would “like to eliminate the waiting room and everything it represents.”
To Feinberg, the waiting room tells patients that the doctor’s time is more important than their own. But organizations increasingly are moving away from that provider-centric model, he writes, and focusing more on the patient.
“When your child is suicidal or your wife has breast cancer or your parent fell down in the bathroom and they’re bleeding, the last thing you want to do is sit and wait,” he writes. “We need to increase access and availability so we can show people we see it is a privilege to take care of them—to tell patients, ‘We are waiting for you.'”
Geisinger wants to eliminate wait times in the ED altogether so that patients can receive care the moment they walk in. Feinberg “really think[s] we can accomplish this in two years,” he says.
Under the wait-free model, “treatment will start the moment patients enter the [ED] because remember, it’s an emergency,” Feinberg writes. This could manifest in many ways, including online registrations, hiring more physicians, or turning current ED waiting rooms into clinical spaces where patients can be treated.
“Treating people like a number is fine at the DMV because you don’t have to go there all the time. It’s not right in the health care system,” Feinberg concludes. “Let’s eliminate waiting rooms once and for all” (Feinberg, LinkedIn, 12/13).
What about the hundreds of patients seen each day with complaints that are NOT true emergencies? If you could eliminate the influx of ridiculous complaints that do not belong in an Emergency Department you would drastically reduce or eliminate wait times. The biggest problem is the abuse of the ER by people who simply don’t want to take the time to make an appointment with thier family doctor then get irate when they have to wait so the ER staff can treat true life threatening emergencies like stroke, heart attack, diabetic emergencies, traumatic injury, and septic shock. Sorry pall your sore finger that’s been stinging for a week isn’t an emergency! Nore is the drug seeking addict who throws thier turkey sandwich at you when they are given a non narcotic pain medication! Find a way to filter out the BS and your wait times will be eliminated.
Is he high?
People who are suicidal or bleeding DON’T wait. And, if someone comes to ED for something minor and is left to wait while a doc tends to a stroke or an MI, guess what? The doctor’s time IS more important than theirs.
Let’s look at studies about who complains over wait times. It ain’t the emergent patients.
I want to see a detailed plan on exactly how you plan on accomplishing this. Eliminating the waiting room, and seeing patients there? Ok, where are you going to find the extra staff? Are you hiring more RNs and MDs? Remember, the people that are waiting in the waiting room are people that could have made an appointment t with their primary.. Cold, flu, headache etc. not all of them are emergencies as your article states… In an ER, a “true emergency” never waits!