An Analysis of the Los Angeles County Hospital Emergency Room Essay

An Analysis of the Los Angeles County Hospital Emergency Room Learning Team Operations Management Plan The problem of emergency department overcrowding has become an important issue for many emergency departments throughout the city and county of Los Angeles. Patients frequently have to wait hours just to get into the emergency department to be seen by a physician or other healthcare professionals. The problem does not seem to be getting better as times goes on, but indeed studies seem to indicate that the condition is growing worse. At a local Los Angeles County Hospital (King Drew Medical Center) emergency department, we found that the problem is especially severe. Patients are forced to wait as long as 8-12 hours to be seen and treated by physicians. This paper will propose a plan that will help to alleviate this critical problem of emergency department overcrowding and long patients waits for services. Problem Statement There is a nationwide shortage of emergency room space and an increased demand for emergency services. Public health officials, hospital executives, and doctors are increasingly concerned about emergency department ''boarding," because of the potential impact on both patient safety and staff burnout (Kowalczyk, 2005). Our paper will attempt to solve the problem of emergency department overcrowding and long waiting times. We propose to first create a flow chart of present operations from the beginning of the emergency department visit to the discharge or admission of the patient. We believe that the process can be analyzed and changed in a way that improvement can be accomplished by improving efficiency and flow of traffic through the emergency department processes. Null Hypothesis Our study attempts to identify a serious problem at a local Los Angeles County Hospital that appears to have plausible solutions. Looking at other similar hospitals throughout the nation and abroad, it appears that restructuring and appropriate panning may help to alleviate long patients’ waits for services. The null hypothesis states that changes in the processes of triage, registration, evaluation, treatment and disposition will shorten waiting times and improve efficiency (mu= changes in process). The alternative hypothesis states that changing in the process of triage, registration, evaluation, treatment and disposition will not change or improve waiti... ...y will be made and expenses reduced by a more efficient process. References Campbell, A.B. (2003). Strategic planning in health care: Methods and application. Quality Management in Health Care, 1(4), 12-23. Kowalczyk, L.(2005). Hospitals strive to reduce waiting lines for beds. Retrieved April 26, 2005 from the world wide world: http:// www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/hospitals ================================================================= Kelton, W. D., R. P. Sadowski, D. A. Sadowski, 2002. Simulation with Arena, Second Edition. New York: McGraw-Hill Higher Education. Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations. Quality in Healthcare. Retrieved April 26, 2005 from the world wide world: http://www.jcaho.org/qualitycheck/ Los Angeles County Hospital (King Drew Medical Center Emergency Room, 2005). Measures to reduce length of stay in the emergency room. LA: Author. Affinity Data Collection Systems. Retrieved April 26, 2005 from the world wide world: www.affinitydata.com. Wilson, A. (2004). Reduction of ED Queues and Elopement Through the Straight Back Approach. .Retrieved April 26, 2005 from the world wide world: http://tgi@thomasgroup.com/