INNOVATION REDUCES ER CONGESTION IN LOWER MAINLAND

NEW WESTMINSTER – Patients visiting the emergency departments of the busiest hospitals in the Lower Mainland will benefit from shorter waits through $20 million in program funding aimed at providing financial incentives for delivering more timely care.“Innovation can help unclog bottlenecks in our public health system and is critical to improving patient access and care,” said Health Services Minister George Abbott. “In some hospitals in Vancouver, 25 per cent of patients waited less as a result of the pay-for-performance pilot, and as the pilot expands to Fraser Health even more patients will benefit from shorter waits in emergency departments.” Pay-for-performance funding to ease emergency department congestion was first piloted in 2007 by Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH). It rewarded hospitals that met predetermined targets for moving patients through the emergency department, either into a hospital bed or back to the community. In the first half of 2008, compared to the first half of 2007, VCH saw:

· Twenty-two per cent more patients with lower medical concerns being treated and discharged from emergency within the two-hour target;
· Thirteen per cent more patients with higher medical concerns getting care within the four-hour target; and,
· Twenty-four per cent more patients who needed to be admitted getting a hospital bed within the 10-hour target.

“The results of our emergency decongestion pilot and the pay-for-performance funding model have been outstanding,” said Dr. Eric Grafstein, an emergency physician and regional emergency services council chair for VCH. “Overall, 30,000 more patients were seen within the target time for discharge from the emergency department or admission to a ward. The success is due not just to the innovation and commitment of physicians and emergency department staff, but to everyone in the hospitals with a role in helping patients get care more quickly.” Following the successful emergency decongestion pilot in four hospitals in Vancouver Coastal Health, the program will continue as a Lower Mainland Innovation and Integration Fund (LMIIF) funded project at Vancouver General, St. Paul’s, Richmond and Lions Gate as well as expanding to Abbotsford Regional Hospital, Burnaby Hospital, Royal Columbian Hospital and Surrey Memorial Hospital in Fraser Health.
-----------------
Backgrounder1 Backgrounder 2