OVERCROWDING

One solution which our ED will not implement is to put a second doctor in the ER instead of having one doctor to manage all 19 beds at once.  This delays the initial visit to the bedside, limits time with the patient and instead adds additional testing to cover all the bases, and finally delays reassessment because the single doctor has too many patients to juggle.

And the patients and visitors get frustrated by the length of stay and take their complaints to THE NURSING STAFF.  It is common for visitors and even the patients to follow the nurses around and harrass them because they are tired of waiting. 

It is nothing new that speeding up the throughput process gains beds and eases overcrowding, but I would suppose it would financially hurt the doctors who are paid by the patient instead of by the hour.

Joe, BSN