Here are two ways ED wait time data can be misleading:
1. If multiple hospitals in a health system share a Medicare group number, their wait times may be averaged and reported as the wait time for one of the hospitals.
2. The wait time reflects the time from a patient’s arrival to the ED until they are seen by a “healthcare professional,” which does not include nurses under CMS’s definition, although nurses can make triage assessments of ED patients, according to the report.
More Articles on Wait Times:
Contra Costa Regional Medical Center Battles ED Crowding
Coming Soon: 32M New Patients — Now is the Time to Assess Your Affordable Care Act Staffing Needs
Shortest Average Physician Wait Time Increases More Than 1 Minute
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