Lovelace Cuts ER Wait Times For Patients

Subtle changes that simplify routine tasks have whittled down the time patients have to spend waiting for emergency room care at Lovelace Westside Hospital.

Procedures introduced in January have successfully cut the average amount of time from the moment the patient walks through the door to the point where they see a provider to 28 minutes, down from about 35 to 40 minutes.

The overall time from arrival to being discharged or admitted into the hospital has been cut from 3.5 hours to 3 hours, said Nancye Cole, chief nursing officer at Lovelace Westside Hospital.

“That may seem little time, but when you are a patient and you come in and you are anxious, the perception of time is a lot longer,” she said.

An average of 1,889 patients per month, or about 62 per day, came to the Westside emergency room from April through June.

Those people are scared and uncertain, and waiting time can seem like “forever,” Cole said.

Reducing the waiting time can also improve patient safety, said Dr. Sanjay Kholwadwala, medical director of the emergency department.

For example, a person suffering chest pains may be having a heart problem and minutes can make a vital difference to the amount of heart muscle damage they could suffer, he said.

Cole and Kholwadwala worked with a committee that studied ways to streamline the processes involved in getting a patient to the medical provider.

The Lovelace emergency department has one physician on duty at all times and up to five nurses during the afternoon and evening busy period.

The committee found that both nursing staff and the medical provider would gather extensive medical and family information from the patient, essentially duplicating the process.

Now, triage nurses gather brief medical information about what symptoms they are experiencing, then the provider gathers the personal and family information while performing a detailed exam.

They also made a critical change to the staffing arrangements. During the busiest period, from 1 to 10 p.m., the nurse in charge is no longer assigned a patient load. Instead, that nurse’s duty is to supervise the work flow — for example, ensuring laboratory tests are delivered quickly. The charge nurse also provides additional support to other nurses as and when needed, Cole said.

A more subtle change involves clothing. Hospital gowns patients wear during examination and treatment have snaps on each sleeve. Volunteers now make sure sleeves are snapped before gowns are handed to patients, saving time during the emergency room process.

“Details can save minutes,” Cole said.
— This article appeared on page 1 of the West Side Journal