Hospitals in pursuit of excellence

Improving ED Flow through the UMLN II--Westmoreland Regional Hospital

The Problem

Like many hospitals, Westmoreland struggled with significant ED crowding and patient boarding. From December 2008 through February 2009, there were 2,519 inpatient admissions from the ED. The average time from the decision to admit a patient to when the patient was admitted to an inpatient bed was 215 minutes.

The Solution

Under the Urgent Matters collaborative, Westmoreland adopted an inpatient report tool as a part of a larger "Building a Bridge" strategy to improve communication between the ED and inpatient floors.