Across the country ambulances are turned away from emergency departments (EDs) and patients are waiting hours and sometimes days to be admitted to a hospital room. Hospitals are finding it hard to get specialist physicians to come to treat emergency patients. Our EDs demand a new way of thinking. They are not at a tipping point; they are at a breaking point. Under current loads and trends they are going to begin to break and these breakdowns will be painful and ultimately dangerous to society.

Recognizing that the ideal in health care is presently beyond our immediate grasp, this book instead focuses on providing health care leaders with the tools they can employ to optimize the performance of EDs and thereby improve service to patients, employees, and communities.

Written by 20 of the most progressive and successful health care reformers in the country, the approaches described can be utilized to quantify improvements, enhance predictability of workflow, and improve staff scheduling. The data derived using these techniques can serve as powerful evidence in support of change. While a common discussion among ED professionals is the perception that many patients are not really emergency patients and could be treated in another setting at another time, that argument is not germane until we as a nation elect to reform the way we chose to deliver healthcare to the underserviced.

In the meantime this book provides invalauable information to help individual hospitals to retool their ED's. It offers new approaches that think outside of the box for all stakeholders. It also provides the statistical evidence that administrators need to make their cases for changes and added resources. It will help you forecast the demand for services and give your center an approach that will allow the ED to become a source of income rather than one that continues to hemorrhage needed limited health care funding.

About the Author
College of Health and Human Services, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA, USA

Reviews

Much as a surgeon uses a scalpel, retractor, and other tools to operate on a patient, Shiver gives the healthcare manager the tools they need to enhance the function of the Emergency Department, the 'front door' of every community's health care system. The text is clear, concise and understandable to those lacking a technical background but who still want to apply fairly sophisticated techniques to improving the patient experience and the productivity of ED staff.- J. Knox Singleton, President and CEO, Inova Health System

Optimizing Emergency Department Throughput is a breakthrough in creating a framework for ED transformation. It uses state-of-the-art improvement techniques to solve problems bedeviling America: crowding and delays in critical treatment. Shiver and Eitel offer clear, practical approaches that leaders can use to get results.- Bruce Siegel MD MPH, Director, Center for Health Care Quality, Department of Health Policy

For those physician leaders and hospital administrators who wonder if there are solutions out there for their frustrating overcrowding and flow issues, this book provides a needed introduction to the science of reengineering your health care delivery system. The authors build on decades of experience together with proven models from the literature that will help you move your organization forward, while improving patient and staff satisfaction.- Christopher MB Fernandes, Professor of Emergency Medicine, University of Western Ontario/Chair, Medical Advisory Committee, London Health Sciences Centre

This is a very practical, idea filled book that should be read by any healthcare professional supervising, dependent upon, working in or "sinking" in one of America's besieged emergency departments. I found myself repeatedly circling, underlining, and writing in the margins throughout the book. In the introduction, Shiver reports that ED's "are not at a tripping point; they are at a breaking point". The "tools" presented in this book can prevent or at least delay your tumble into that seemingly inevitable abyss.- Robert J. Cates MS, MD, Chairman of Emergency Medicine, Inova Fairfax Hospital

Because the ED is a major gateway to all hospital services, a public health asset, and an economic driver or millstone, Optimizing Emergency Department Throughput is an essential read for all CNEs, COOs and CEOs.- Lawrence L. White, Jr. MHA, FACHE, Research Assistant Professor, School of Public and Community Health Sciences, University of Montana

Book Information
ISBN 9781420083774
Author John M. Shiver
Format Paperback
Page Count 260
Imprint Productivity Press
Publisher Taylor & Francis Inc
Weight(grams) 480g