ED Wait Times

[fakingpatience]

My longest wait time was 6 hours. Average was an hour or two. I saw 2 major problems with the hospital systems (not counting the fact they were taking an ambulance off the street), 1, they wouldn't let us put BS patients in the waiting room (I got told "I already have to many patients out there, that won't help me any" when asking the charge nurse if we could put our patient there). And 2, occasionally we were waiting the extended times with actually sick patients, who are then not getting any further treatment, as we are on hospital grounds and can no longer treat them; a few weeks ago I waited an hour with a patient in a-fib w/ RVR rate ~170, after telling the staff numerous times my concern for her.

The hospitals would have us stay with patients even if they had open beds, if they didn't have enough staff to "open" those rooms. I considered this using us as extra staff, why pay to have appropriate staffing when you can just keep EMS crews there to watch the patients for you?

Officially we weren't supposed to be kept waiting longer than 30 mins, but no company in the area would let the crews put the patient in an open bed and leave, as this would anger the hospitals, and their main concern was keeping them happy to keep to contracts.

[MariB]

I have never waited as of yet. I have been on many calls as a driver. We call in, the door is opened for us, our room is verbally assigned as we walk in, and we go in.

We give verbal report, do a PCR, print off, clean up and go back in service.

[HarryM]

If we spend longer than 20min handing a patient over to ED we get a page saying "Time at hospital has been over 20min. Please clear ASAP or advise of length of delay."

[triemal04]

Probably 20-30 minutes and that doesn't happen all that often. One of the lucky ones I suppose.

we were waiting the extended times with actually sick patients, who are then not getting any further treatment, as we are on hospital grounds and can no longer treat them;

Wait...what? You aren't allowed to continue treating your patient because...you are on hospital property? Even though NOBODY ELSE is treating the patient? Please explain...

[fakingpatience]

Wait...what? You aren't allowed to continue treating your patient because...you are on hospital property? Even though NOBODY ELSE is treating the patient? Please explain...

Once we are on hospital property, the patient is technically the hospital's patient. We are waiting inside a hallway of the ER for a room, the only equipment we have with us is the cardiac monitor (which some supervisors encouraged us to turn off once we had been triaged and were just waiting for a room, to "show" the hospital the patient was their responsibility... I refused to do that). We were not allowed to further treat the patient, as they were no longer "our" patient, and as the patient was not in an ER room and being seen by a dr, the hospital would not treat them either. On 1 call I was able to give my waiting pt additional pain medication that I had left over in the vial (was going to waste) with permission from the attending Dr, but this was an exception, not at all the norm. If we had fluids or anything running we would continue that while waiting, but not start anything new. Now typically we were not kept waiting with "critical" patients, however on occasion we have been (such as the a-fib w/ RVR patient, another patient on CPAP... both of these were at the same hospital)

Believe me, I know how bad for patient care this sounds, thats why I got out of that system as soon as possible (started my new job this month!)

[Happiness]

Once we are on hospital property, the patient is technically the hospital's patient. We are waiting inside a hallway of the ER for a room, the only equipment we have with us is the cardiac monitor (which some supervisors encouraged us to turn off once we had been triaged and were just waiting for a room, to "show" the hospital the patient was their responsibility... I refused to do that). We were not allowed to further treat the patient, as they were no longer "our" patient, and as the patient was not in an ER room and being seen by a dr, the hospital would not treat them either. On 1 call I was able to give my waiting pt additional pain medication that I had left over in the vial (was going to waste) with permission from the attending Dr, but this was an exception, not at all the norm. If we had fluids or anything running we would continue that while waiting, but not start anything new. Now typically we were not kept waiting with "critical" patients, however on occasion we have been (such as the a-fib w/ RVR patient, another patient on CPAP... both of these were at the same hospital)

Believe me, I know how bad for patient care this sounds, thats why I got out of that system as soon as possible (started my new job this month!)

Congrats on the new job and getting out of that system. That just sounds like a horrible place to work.

We dont have the wait times but with being said we do stay and help if needed. If we are helping with CPR or other critical care issues, the pt goes in, we give the report, the cot goes out with the driver who then gets the car clean and ready for another one if need be. We clear with dispatch (letting them know that we are helping) and then we carry on for how ever long it takes.

[MikeEMT]

no offense but it sounds like they are too lazy to do their own vitals. But don't fix it if it aint broke I guess.

Its not laziness. It works in our system and makes for an efficient way to get patients seen. Might not work for you, but works for us. The other hospitals don't take vitals until long after we leave otherwise they would probably have us do the same thing. I don't mind it and quite frankly gives me something to do as the driver instead of just standing there. I also like seeing how my vitals match up when I am teching.

Okay, seriously, WTF is a HEAR?

A HEAR is what we call our radio report to the ER. It stands for Hospital Emergency Alert Radio.

[Arctickat]

Oh, so it's a radio report. Shoulda said that in the first place.

[Just Plain Ruff]

Its not laziness. It works in our system and makes for an efficient way to get patients seen. Might not work for you, but works for us. The other hospitals don't take vitals until long after we leave otherwise they would probably have us do the same thing. I don't mind it and quite frankly gives me something to do as the driver instead of just standing there. I also like seeing how my vitals match up when I am teching.

A HEAR is what we call our radio report to the ER. It stands for Hospital Emergency Alert Radio.

Mike, Like I said, if it works for you then don't fix it, it just sounds like laziness to me on the part of the hospital. More power to your system if it works for you guys. Your system is quite different from the ones I worked in so if it works on your end, then keep it up, sounds like a winner in your area, at least for that facility.

There's nothing more I disliked than sitting around with a patient having to explain to them why they were waiting on the gurney when we wheeled the patient by 5 open rooms, waiting for 10-30 minutes. frustrated the hell out of me and also the hell out of the patient.

[Cookie]

The two local hospitals we go to have no wait times if you bring someone in an ambulance, walk in's sometime wait just a few minutes, nothing extroidanary. However I have said to all who know me, if anything happens and I have to go north to one of two trauma centers in Omaha, you had better not take me to xxxx because I will refuse care, even if I am unconscious to begin with and wake up in their ER I will refuse care and ask for an ambulance to take me to the other one. This hospital let my sister lie in the Er for five hours with a collasped lung, when her Dr. told them to put her in a room, my brother in law continued to ask why they were waiting and they told them they were trying to find her a room. My brother in law went up to the floor and asked around and found out no one had any idea they had a pt waiting, seems no one bothered to check for a room. Another time in this same ER she waited 3 hours with difficulty breathing and got up and left. They had not idea she left for another four hours. End of my rant.