Posted Emergency Department Wait Times Are Not Always Accurate

Advertising Emergency Department Wait Times

Advertising emergency department (ED) wait times has become a common practice in the United States. Proponents of this practice state that it is a powerful marketing strategy that can help steer patients to the ED. Opponents worry about the risk to the public health that arises from a patient with an emergent condition self-triaging to a further hospital, problems with inaccuracy and lack of st...

Rural-urban differences in emergency department wait times.

INTRODUCTION I sought to determine whether emergency department (ED) volume is associated with differing ED wait times. METHODS I conducted a retrospective analysis of the Emergency Department Reporting System database of the Ontario Ministry of Health. I abstracted ED length of stay for patient visits to 117 hospital EDs during the second quarter of 2008, representing 89% of ED visits in the...

Association of race/ethnicity with emergency department wait times.

OBJECTIVE To determine whether wait times for children treated in emergency departments (EDs) nationally are associated with patient race/ethnicity. METHODS Data were obtained from the National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey, which collects information on patient visits to EDs throughout the United States. We examined data for patients < or =15 years of age who presented to EDs durin...

Unacceptable emergency wait times.

Are patients with longer emergency department wait times less likely to consent to research?

OBJECTIVES There are unique challenges to enrolling patients in emergency department (ED) clinical research studies, including the time-sensitive nature of emergency conditions, the acute care environment, and the lack of an established relationship with patients. Prolonged ED wait times have been associated with a variety of adverse effects on patient care. The objective of this study was to a...