Articles Tagged With: boarding
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Long Waits Raise Risk of Death for Admitted Patients
Boarding of admitted patients in EDs for longer than five hours is linked to a higher risk of death in the following 30 days, a group of researchers found.
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Youth Spend Days in EDs Waiting for Psychiatric Inpatient Care
Negative care outcomes, treatment delays, risk of injury (to patients, family, or staff), and poor satisfaction are undesirable outcomes resulting from boarding.
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No Reassessment of Patients in Waiting Room or Hallway Is Malpractice Risk
CMS has been clear: EMTALA applies no matter where a patient comes to the hospital, as well as no matter where the patient is seen. That includes the ED waiting room and hallways. Boarding in the hallway should include periodic checking in with the patient to be sure there has not been a significant adverse change that requires the patient to be moved to a higher level clinical setting.
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Evidence Shows Boarding Harms All Admitted ED Patients
In a recent study, researchers noted the median length of stay for all admitted patients increased 12.4 minutes in one ED and 14 minutes in another ED for every boarded patient. In addition to boarding, investigators studied other variables, such as quality improvement efforts and hospital capacity. Teams should understand their role in the larger process. All should be working toward the same goal, held accountable by leaders throughout the organization. -
Protecting At-Risk Patients from Self-Harm in the ED
Researchers try to create a safer environment to keep patients and staff alike safe.
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Alleviate Risks if Patients Leave Without Being Seen
There is a tendency to assume that if someone left the ED, he or she probably was not that sick. That is a dangerous assumption. For all patients who leave without being seen, the nurse manager should follow up with a call within 24 hours.
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ED Boarding Prolongs Length of Stay for Trauma Patients
One department changed its processes to reduce the number of patients who left without being seen — specifically, working to put a patient in front of a clinician faster. When the ED fixed this issue, door-to-doctor times and door-to-disposition times shortened significantly, and leave without being seen rates declined sharply.
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Hospitals Mistakenly View Boarding as an ‘ED Problem’
Since hospitals rely on elective surgeries for financial viability, patients admitted from the ED tend to be a somewhat lower priority. Asking hospital administrators to observe the risks of ED boarding firsthand can help change this perception.
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Report Links ED Boarding to Worse Clinical Outcomes
Some hospitals have found a novel solution in the form of resuscitative care units, which are ICUs based in EDs. Patients who need time-sensitive respiratory, metabolic, neurologic, or hemodynamic critical care can receive it in the ED. This prevents these patients from waiting so long for a bed to finally open in the appropriate specialty ICU.
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Courts, Plaintiff Attorneys Scrutinizing ED Boarding of Psychiatric Patients
Patients visit emergency departments (EDs) with acute psychiatric illnesses that need to be addressed. The problem is that hospitals may not be providing those services on an outpatient or inpatient basis. If the ED psychiatric patient requires inpatient services, there may be nowhere available to send the patient.