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An award winning newsletter for Orange Regional Medical Center employees, physicians and volunteers
February 2017
From The President & CEO Thank you to everyone who has been working diligently on reducing Emergency Department (ED) overcrowding. This is a top priority and must remain a focus. We have identified many areas throughout the hospital that have been instrumental in successfully Scott Batulis reducing the number of patients we President & CEO are holding in the ED for inpatient beds. Additionally, we have not been on ambulance diversion since January 16. This is excellent progress and a huge improvement! In January, we created a 12-bed Clinical Decision Area (CDA) within the main hospital’s Same Day Surgery (SDS) area for observation patients throughout the hospital. The result has been a more coordinated level of care for the observation patients while freeing up inpatient beds and allowing us to admit ED patients more quickly. We have also implemented a Rapid Assessment Zone (RAZ) in the ED triage area from 11:00 a.m. – 11:00 p.m. daily. This is a new emergency patient care program in which a provider participates in the triage process and can quickly assess a patient’s condition. At this point, the provider can either treat and discharge a patient or recommend more acute care. We have added back into operation and are staffing three patient rooms on 5 West. Additionally, we have identified enough alcove spaces on various med/surg units to increase inpatient capacity by 21 beds. These areas will be slightly renovated and equipped with a bed, television, nightstand and a curtain. While this is a practice recently sanctioned by the NYS Department of Health as a way to handle overcrowding, it will be used only in extreme situations.
The majority of admitted patients holding in the ED require telemetry monitoring. Efforts are in place to be sure best practice criteria are being followed for telemetry inpatients in an attempt to free up telemetry beds more quickly. When inpatients remain in telemetry care past what is appropriate for their condition, it limits the number of telemetry beds available for the patients holding in the ED. It is necessary for everyone to support the telemetry criteria to maximize the use of these beds. Case management has increased their hours in the ED and we have had success with discharging inpatients earlier in the day. We are also looking at creating a Discharge Lounge. This would be a designated area in the hospital where discharged patients could wait for transportation home allowing their room to be cleaned and prepped for the next patient. There are concentrated efforts on reducing length of stay and readmission rates. These areas have a significant impact on inpatient bed capacity, which ultimately affects ED overcrowding. We have also increased awareness about our Urgent Care services in the new Outpatient Building at Orange Regional and also in Monroe near Stop & Shop, in an attempt to educate our patients and the community about when to use Urgent Care versus the ED. Thank you for your continued support as we strive to improve the health of our community.
Scott Batulis, President & CEO
Orange Regional “Goes Red” On February 3, Orange Regional staff and the Cardiology Department “went red” in support of the American Heart Association's Wear Red Day. Supporting the fight against women's heart disease and stroke is a long standing tradition at Orange Regional.