Reducing emergency department (ED) wait times are a major priority for the Ontario Government. Overcrowded EDs, cumulative effects of the delays in hospital processes and lack of resources are manifested in the phenomenon of long wait times. This thesis aims to estimate in real-time, a minimum wait time confidence interval for urgent abdominal pain patients on weekdays based on ED operations, waiting room status and ED census indicators through multivariate backwards stepwise regression modeling.
The ED wait times model accurately predicted a 95% wait time confidence interval for patients. Common underlying factors attributed to long wait times include the total number of emergent and urgent patients in the waiting room, the total number of patient waiting for a consultation and the number of patients not seen within the Ontario Government’s target times. This information is useful in managing patient expectations and appropriately allocating resources to improve wait times.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:TORONTO/oai:tspace.library.utoronto.ca:1807/25447 |
| Date | 15 December 2010 |
| Creators | Chan, Pamela |
| Contributors | Carter, Michael W. |
| Source Sets | University of Toronto |
| Language | en_ca |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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