OBJECTIVES To explore emergency department (ED) patient expectations regarding staff communication with patients, wait times, the triage process and information management. METHODS We conducted a cross-sectional English-language telephone survey among patients aged 18 years or older who visited the EDs in the Calgary Health Region in 2002. Survey items were based on a preceding qualitative st...

BACKGROUND Triage liaison physicians (TLPs) have been employed in overcrowded emergency departments (EDs); however, their effectiveness remains unclear. OBJECTIVES To evaluate the implementation of TLP shifts at an academic tertiary care adult ED using comprehensive outcome reporting. METHODS A six-week TLP clinical research project was conducted between December 9, 2005, and February 9, 20...

Project background: In 2010 an internationally renowned American healthcare organisation partnered with Irish industry and higher education in Waterford with the goal to expand their telehealth services. Combining the skills and expertise of Nurse Consultants, Nurse Educators, IT Specialists and Healthcare Executives, these collaborative partnerships led to the delivery of telehealth services t...

BACKGROUND Out-of-hours (OOH) health care for acute medical problems is often challenged by long waiting time for callers in need of advice and triage. Allowing patients to bypass the OOH telephone waiting line may increase patient satisfaction and provide them with a feeling of safety. We aimed to develop an "emergency access button" enabling patients to bypass the normal telephone waiting lin...

Introduction. General practitioners (GP) answer calls to the Danish out-of-hours primary care service (OOH) in Denmark, and this is a subject of discussions about quality and cost-effectiveness. The aim of this study was to estimate changes in fee costs if nurses substituted the GPs. Methods. We applied experiences from The Netherlands on nurse performance in the OOH triage concerning the numbe...

Location monitoring system for rescue disable persons by switching the location estimation methods with GPS, ZigBee and WiFi beacon is proposed. Rescue system with triage using health condition monitoring together with location and attitude monitoring as well as the other data acquired with mobile devices is evaluated with the proposed location monitoring system. Through simulation study, influ...