Patient Flow in Waiting Room
Healthcare clinics are under a great deal of pressure to reduce costs and improve quality of service. In recent years, healthcare organizations have concentrated on preventive medicine practices and have tried to reduce the length of time that patients stay in a hospital. Outpatient services have gradually become an essential component of healthcare. Organizations that cannot make their outpatient component cost-effective are finding themselves financially burdened in this ever-changing industry (Caldwell, 2005).
Patient waiting times and waiting-room congestion in outpatient settings are two challenges facing the healthcare industry. Survey results indicate that excessive waiting time is often the major reason for patients' dissatisfaction with outpatient services. Waiting times of 10 to 15 minutes are considered reasonable.
Outpatient clinics are in essence queuing systems. These systems embody a unique set of conditions that must be considered when examining the appointment making procedure. Patient flow is simplified when scheduled patients arrive punctually and a single doctor serves them within predefined processing times. The flow gets more complicated when multiple doctors are involved or patients arrive late. Other factors that may complicate the flow are no-shows, walk-ins, and emergencies. In addition, doctors are sometimes delayed or interrupted throughout the course of the day by events not directly related to medical consultation.
The flow of an established patient in the waiting room is the subject of this process analysis. The process begins when the patient walks in the door. If the receptionist is not helping another patient, she greets the patient that has just walked in. The patient waits in line to check in with the receptionist (he or she enters the Arrival Queue). Once the patient reaches the desk, the receptionist asks if he/she has an appointment. If the patient does have an appointment, the receptionist "arrives" the patient, which consists of checking the patient into the computer system. Then, the receptionist checks the patient's demographics, which takes approximately two (2) minutes. Next, the receptionist asks if the patient has insurance. If the patient does have insurance, the receptionist collects their co-pay and asks them to take a seat and wait for their name to be called. If the patient does not have insurance, they are asked to fill out an eligibility waiver form (this takes five minutes), then asked to sit down. At this point, the patient enters the Waiting Queue, which acts as a buffer for the next stage of the patient flow: the medical consultation or examination itself.
Based on the data from Hospital Compare two of the measures that need some improvement are the patient experience and timely effective care, particularly the emergency department. These two measures are associated with the quality dimensions of timeliness and patient centerness. Timely and effective care can play
The Crowded Clinic: Critical Analysis The Crowded Clinic Case Study (Colorado State University - Global, n.d.) discusses the issues of practice management as they apply to access to care. Access to care may be as inconvenient as lengthy patient wait times to issues far more serious that may have a profound effect on the health and well-being of a single patient or an entire cohort. In order to properly address the issue and look for a remedy, it is necessary to understand the underlying conditions that create the problem before creating the means to manage the change required to correct the problem. The Crowded Clinic has multiple issues, including social and operational, which are creating the associated inaccessibility to services.
Because of the lack of organization with the health care providers in Canada, the wait times are too long and can cause serious complications to any condition the patient went in for in the first place. This situation of how the health care system can resolve wait times was brought to the government but they continue to ignore the proposals brought to them. It is possible to resolve the problems of wait times without extreme change and expenses in the health care system. The solution is to be found in the reorganization of the health care providers. Lack of assistance in the emergency room can make ones illness to become worse, therefore, causes the patient to be forced to wait in emergency rooms for an extended period of time and when they are finally seen by a health care provider, the outcome is very poor due to lack of registered staff, physicians and proper assessment(Goldman & Macpherson, 2005, p.40). The objective of this paper is to discuss and critically analyze the conditions of emergency waiting rooms. The specific issue this paper intends to explore is extensive and prolonged waiting times for patients accessing health care, patients who need urgent treatment and the vulnerability of elderly patients and children. With an in-depth critique of the barriers to health care and shortcomings of emergency rooms, strategies will be provided to enhance a health care system that makes it more accessible and efficient.
... revealed that longer waiting times has negatively impacted the lives of not only patients, but also healthcare providers . Some QI strategies implemented such as simulation tools, fast -track and reorganization of the ED by several hospitals has shown some improvement in workflow thus decreasing overcrowding and the length of time spent in the ED. As healthcare leaders, the focus should reside on ongoing advocacy for new policies or guidelines to resolve the waiting time issues and addressing limitations of previous interventions. Addressing the ED issues, Leaders should abide by the IOM report considering overcrowding as a mostly external or a system-wide issue. Implementing preventive measures described earlier will help not only to decrease WT in the ED, but also to avoid future incidents similar to the one recently experienced in St Barnabas Hospital.
Emergency departments of hospitals are fundamental in the treatment of time sensitive conditions such as acute stroke (Trzeciak & Rivers, 2003). A stroke occurs when there is an interruption of blood flow to brain tissue, and therefore is a condition that relies on apt and adequate access to healthcare (Panagos, 2006). Patients who have experienced a stroke will most often present to emergency departments in order to receive treatment (Kothari et al, 1998). However it has been found by Chan et al (2010) that approximately 48% of American hospitals are operating over capacity and therefore not providing satisfactory healthcare. Overcrowding can be defined as the overabundance of patients requiring treatment and may be attributable to the misuse of the emergency area by non-critical patients (Chan et al, 2010; Trzeciak & Rivers, 2003). This has the potential to negatively affect outcomes for stroke patients. The aim of this essay is to investigate factors such as patient knowledge, wait times and patient safety in order to examine the effects of overcrowding of emergency departments on stroke patients.
Allowing the patients to choose the scheduled time of when to make an appointment with the physician makes them feel welcome. The flexibility is increased significantly; besides, the fact is a personal commitment makes them feel the need to see the doctors for treatments. The clinics may also consider moving hospitals closer to their patients. Alternatively they may opt to have mobile clinics when they have the highest patient turn out and take treatment to those who feel they may otherwise not be able to afford treatment (Humphries & Eddy, 2000). Reminders also helps to increase the attendance rate since patients may fail to attend due to finances and busy schedules (Phipps, 2003).
V ́ericourt, F., & Jennings, O. B. (n.d.). Nurse-to-patient ratios in hospital staffing: a queuing perspective. Retrieved from https://faculty.fuqua.duke.edu/~fdv1/bio/ratios3.pdf
As part of the health care reform, many hospitals have focused their marketing strategies on population health management as part of the transformation to value-based care. Managing population health requires a close relationships with physicians, partnerships with organizations in the community, and expansion into preventive and outpatient care and therefore must be implemented further. Likewise, comprised as key components are investing in technology - to connect with physicians, customers and the community and gather data necessary for improving quality (Takvorian, 2015) and merging with other hospitals and health care systems - consolidation as a strategy to gain capital necessary for health IT investments, outpatient facility construction, physician partnerships and other projects (Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, 2015; Ropak, 2012).
From my own experience, physicians over-book their schedules and have the patients spend more time in the waiting room than they actually spend with the doctor. The cost of healthcare is thought the roof, especially for the patients over the age of 65 who have United Healthcare Medicare Complete or Blue Chip of Medicare and have co-pays of $50 a visit and see 5 different specialist a month. In my opinion, I do not think that is fair and it is poor patient-centered care. As part of my job I have to fill the doctor’s schedule when there is a cancellation, but I can only fill it with the people on the cancellation list who can generate a procedure. How about the other individuals? The physicians only care about generating procedures because it is more money in their
In today's health care environment many factors contribute to quality care. As a medical practice manager it is important to provide the best medical service for patients in addition to excellent levels of service. Appointment scheduling is a very important aspect of a smooth running medical practice. Appointment cancellation, no shows, and long waiting time by patients have a negative impact on the efficient running of the practice not only in lost revenue but the practices professional reputation as well (Kruse 2010).
The film, “The Waiting Room,” is a documentary that records the events at a public emergency room over the course of 24 hours. It reveals testimonials of both patients and workers throughout their stressful and unpredictable days.
Managed care, managed care has become the dominant health care delivery source. Gaining popularity in 1990s, managed care increased from 27% in 1988 to 99% in 2009 and enrollment in Fee for Service plans decli...
Blum,J.,(2011). Improving quality, lowering cost: The role of health care delivery system: U. S Department of health and human services.
Timeliness in medical care can be of the utmost importance. Letting things progress can result in a slippery circle, where a minor infection, untreated end up being life threatening. With increased damage caused by neglecting health care, or waiting on a health care provider, the physical damage, and costs associated increase, often exponentially.
However, patients should register again and keep waiting for the specialist out-patient clinics. In light of the evidence, a streamlined process is being implemented so as to minimize the patient time. Based on the given reference, it is probable that services diminish the time externally. In fact, patients seem to be just waiting for help. Predictability :