November 30th, 2011

The Morning Call reports that the Lehigh Valley-Muhlenberg’s hospitals $7.25 million renovation aims to cut down on patients wait time to provide better care.

“This was a very, very big change for our providers,” said Dr. David Burmeister, interim chairman of Lehigh Valley Health Network’s Department of Emergency Medicine. “And this puts the patient in front of the provider as fast as we can get them there.”

“The one thing that we do know that is absolute and certain,” added Dr. John Wheary, director of Muhlenberg’s emergency department, “is it does nobody any good to have people sitting out in the waiting room.”

So now, when a patient arrives at the emergency department, they’ll register and be seen by a team, including a doctor, nurse and assistant. The patient has to answer questions about their condition only once, and the doctor can move the patient to different areas of the emergency department, depending on the severity of his or her condition. If things work properly, overall times in the department should be 20 to 30 minutes less, Burmeister said.