Chatham-Kent’s hospital has introduced a new policy in an effort to reduce wait times and improve patient flow within Emergency Departments.
The Chatham-Kent Health Alliance (CKHA) has created the Emergency Department Gridlock Procedure, which is initiated in the event that there is a high volume of patients in the Emergency Department and a low number of available beds in the hospital.
Caen Suni, CKHA’s vice president of clinical programs and operations, said the procedure ensures the EDs at the hospitals Chatham and Wallaceburg sites continue to run well and are able to serve the community.
“It includes extraordinary measures for patient discharge, ensuring patients can be placed up on the inpatient unit, as well as bringing patients, if we can safely do so, into the nursing station, versus having them wait inside the Emergency Department or in a hallway,” said Suni.
Suni said the procedure will help CKHA to better manage inpatient beds inside the hospital and prevent surgical cancellations as well.
“We know that we’ve experienced quite a few of these near-gridlock situations or full gridlock situations last fall during flu season,” he said. “Getting ahead of it is critical.”
Suni added that it would not be possible to run the hospital with the Gridlock Procedure in place at all times as it would not be sustainable.
For the month of April, 86 per cent of patients attending CKHA’s emergency departments were moved to a hospital bed within five hours. The previous average wait time was eight hours.
