Front Lines Improving Performance Initiative

In 2009, the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care introduced the Emergency Department ALC Wait-Times strategy. Targeted funding was directed to hospitals to improve Emergency Department (ED) wait-times, also known as “Pay for Results” or P4R funding, by applying lean thinking and methodology to determinants of ED wait-times.

Woodstock Hospital became 1 of 74 Pay for Results (P4R) hospitals in Ontario in April of 2014. The goal of Woodstock Hospital’s Front Lines Improving Performance (FLIP) team is to optimize the quality of care including patient safety and satisfaction, while reducing a patient’s length of stay at Woodstock Hospital. Woodstock Hospital’s FLIP team is focused on improving the patient experience by building internal processes for long-term, sustainable change across the entire hospital.

In 2018-19, Woodstock Hospital was ranked 4^th out of 74 hospitals in Ontario for overall Emergency Department wait time considering all 6 P4R wait time indicators, including:

• Rank 2^nd in shortest length of stay for all patients admitted from the ED
• Rank 2^nd in time it takes to move from the ED to a comfortable In-patient room
• Rank 14^th in time taken to offload an ambulance and return it to the community
• Rank 5^th in shortest length of stay for non-admitted complex patients
• Rank 10th in shortest length of stay for non-admitted minor patients

Woodstock Hospital takes a leadership role in implementing best practices to improve patient experience, such as being the first hospital in the LHIN to introduce pharmacy technicians in the Emergency Department to support medication reconciliation.

This year’s FLIP initiatives will see a continuation of many of last year’s projects, such as Pharmacy Technicians completing accurate medication lists in the ED, the use of medical directives by ED nurses to initiate patient care, moving admitted patients out of the ED quickly and efficiently and additional physiotherapy support to ensure patients maintain or improve their mobility while in hospital. In addition, the FLIP team will focus on matching ED physician resources to peak demand times, reducing EMS ambulance offload times and reducing re-visits by improving discharge planning and instructions to patients.