DE-crowding the ED

[NRSKarenRN, BSN, RN]

from healthleaders.com magazine, december 2004

some great ideas here! karen

full article: de-crowding the ed

...youth recruits

in a multifaceted effort, baptist's three memphis-area hospitals are recruiting nontraditional volunteers to help out in the ed and educating the general public about the problem of emergency room overcrowding.

"experience critical," a program under which young volunteers assist with indirect care of ed patients, kicked off in september, with recruiting drives at the three memphis-area facilities. more than 100 volunteers applied for the program in its first month, overwhelming the program's sponsors.

"it's not as though we're going to turn anyone away," says an elated chuck mcglasson, r.n., director of emergency services at baptist memorial hospital, with 625 staffed beds and an ed that sees 50,000 patients a year. "we'll take anybody who wants to come." in fact, baptist has already trained 50 of those volunteers....

...the program is built around nontraditional volunteers-individuals who are younger than the typically elderly hospital volunteer-who are given roles more directly exposed to ed operations. the hospital puts them to work doing whatever can be done without actual involvement in medical care. it's a learning opportunity, to be sure, but according to baptist memorial vice president and chief nursing officer beverly jordan, r.n., there is "a dual strategy" in play. "one element is to allow college-age students to glimpse healthcare in some of its finest hours and hopefully to woo some of them into healthcare careers," she says. the other goal, she points out, is to engage students as part of the healthcare team, allowing them to take on such tasks as providing comfort measures, fetching supplies, carrying lab specimens and assisting with patient transport....

.,...relieving congestion

but taking better advantage of volunteer help is only half of the equation. ten months before its volunteer drive, baptist rolled out a series of public service announcements aimed at neutralizing a negative perception about emergency room overcrowding. every year around flu season, the evening news would run stories about local ers being swamped again. "people who saw these stories might not realize this issue was not specific to memphis," explains courtney liebenrood, director of public relations for baptist memorial. "so we wanted to put things in perspective and show that it's not something the hospitals were doing wrong."

one television psa opens with a scene that could come straight from the drama series er: emts and nurses hustle a stretcher down a corridor. the patient sneezes, and a doctor barks out: "we've got acute stuffiness!" a voice-over cites figures about the rise in non-emergent cases in ers. "help relieve er congestion," the announcer intones. "colds and flu are best treated by your doctor or in a minor medical facility."....

got a good marketing/website guru launching the experience critical program: http://www.experiencecritical.com/