The Sweet-Spot in the Patient Throughput Saga

Portland, Oregon.
Harrisburg, Pennsulvania.
Louisville, Kentucky.
El Paso, Texas.

Q. What do these four mid-size cities have in common?

A. According to a recent study conducted by the AHA, hospitals in these areas face similar ED capacity and patient boarding issues.

Crothall Services Group provides an integrated approach to patient throughput and bed turn around times.

As a matter of fact, more and more community hospitals throughout the country are experiencing similar situations. There are too many patients coming through the ED doors, with too few critical care beds available. Although a lack of critical care beds is the most obvious drag on patient throughput, it is not the only factor at work. Population growth and a lack of physicians in certain geographical areas also play a role. This leads to the "boarding" of patients, who may remain in the ED, or even corridors, for hours because the hospital does not have the capacity to provide a bed expeditiously.

The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations recognizes ED crowding as barrier to patient safety and effective outcomes. The longer a patient is boarded, the less positive the treatment outcome will be. Emergency Departments have historically been designed to provide just in time triage treatment to those individuals who present for care, stabilize them, and move them into the appropriate unit within the hospital for ongoing or critical care. Today, Emergency Department staff must be trained and prepared to provide critical care to patients for a much longer period of time than in the past.

The Right Patients in the Right Beds, Faster.

Many hospitals have turned to a systemic approach in addressing the patient throughput challenge. Administrators realize that the problem doesn't begin in the ED, but rather arises because of issues that occur in other areas of the hospital on a daily basis. By modeling patient flows throughout their organizations, leaders are recognizing that the three main components that impact throughput are the number of ICU beds available, surgical scheduling processes, and the ability to quickly turn dirty beds into clean ones. Understanding the interconnectedness of these three items, many hospitals are integrating more ICU beds into their facilities, have incorporated better surgical scheduling techniques into their processes, and insist on more efficient bed turn around times from the staff. What does this accomplish? It places the right patients into the right beds, faster.

This is where Crothall Services Group comes in. Our Environmental Services (EVS) teams have studied the layout of the rooms they are responsible for maintaining, and in most instances, turn those rooms around within the 60 minute window considered to be the "gold" standard within the industry. However, in many instances, our teams have significantly reduced the amount of time that it takes to clean a room and make a much needed bed available for a patient.

Envision a Crothall Services EVS technician equipped not only with a cleaning cart, but also a harness that holds the most used items and products needed during the cleaning process. By holstering this equipment, it saves technicians the time wasted by walking back and forth to the carts to retrieve them. Through careful choreographing of literally every step a technician takes during the process of cleaning a room, Crothall has effectively reduced the turn around time for a room to approximately 53.5 minutes.

Crothall’s Seamless Approach

To experience even more efficiency in patient throughput, many hospitals and healthcare organizations have incorporated Crothall's Patient Transportation services along with EVS. This creates a seamless approach to both services, and provides the opportunity to begin the turn around process much sooner. The moment a patient is discharged and crosses the threshold of the room, the Patient Transportation Specialist interacts with our Hospitality Resource Center (HRC), which automatically creates a discharge cleaning task. An EVS tech is immediately dispatched to the room and gets to work. Should there be multiple discharges within a particular unit simultaneously, the HRC dispatcher is instantly aware and can reassign staff accordingly, thus ensuring the quickest turn around possible for the entire organization. It isn't out of the ordinary to see a Department Manager chipping in when these mass migrations occur.