Speaker 1: Why are the waits in the ER so long? You will not believe the main reason for this. You're not going to believe it. Stick around to the end of this video to find out because we have the CEO of our healthcare system here in this region to help us answer this question.

Speaker 2: Hi there. I'm Melissa Farrell, the president and CEO at Halton Healthcare, happy to help you answer this question.

Speaker 1: What's the question? The question is, why are the wait times in the emergency rooms so long?

Speaker 2: Well, often people think that the waits in eMERGE have to do with inappropriate patients showing up in eMERGE who could be treated elsewhere. That's part of it for sure. So there's definitely a patient population that could be going to primary care, seeing their family docs. But it's largely to do with the fact that the front door is open, but the back door is closed. And so it has to do with us being, it's the flow, has to do with us being able to transfer patients who no longer need hospital related care out to more appropriate settings like long-term care and home care.

Speaker 1: Right. So you come into the emergency room with an issue and then you may be discharged home or you may have to be admitted. If you have to be admitted to the hospital, there has to be a bed in the hospital for you to go to. However, often that bed in the hospital is occupied by a patient that no longer needs to be in the hospital, but can't go anywhere else because they need an alternate level of care. And that's, you're saying the biggest hangup?

Speaker 2: That's right. That's absolutely true. And in our province, about one in six beds is blocked by a patient who is considered what's called alternate levels of care. So they could be more appropriately cared for in an alternate setting.

Speaker 3: And then I'm sure you're thinking, well, if that person is just waiting for a bed, aren't they just easy to manage down in the ER? Well, no, is the first answer. So that person now requires nursing care, doctor care, who those people now are pulled away from the new people that are waiting in line to get seen and hopefully discharged with something that maybe can be treated more readily.

Speaker 2: That's right.

Speaker 1: So you're feeling it, but we're feeling it as well. It is very frustrating. However, give us some hope. Is this going to get better? And what are the strategies we're doing to try and make this better?

Speaker 2: I would say absolutely. There's opportunities for us to be working with our community partners to make that situation better. There's lots of work that's going on to actually help us support patients getting home care more effectively and efficiently outside of hospitals, and we're doing tons of work on that here. And then, of course, there's always things that we can be doing within the eMERGE too, making sure we're posting our wait times online, making sure that we have fast track processes for patients. So there's tons of work that we are doing to try to make that situation better.

Speaker 1: And would you say it's getting a little better?

Speaker 2: Absolutely. I think it's a lot better, certainly better than it was during the pandemic, for sure. And we're really seeing our wait times come down.

Speaker 3: I think one of the really important take home messages is don't take it out on the ER staff. These are the critical folks who are working so hard to deal with the people there. The line is not there because they're not doing their job, it's because they're doing three different jobs and seeing twice as many patients as they need to because there simply is not the space for the reasons that we mentioned. So please send them love, not anger and rage.

Speaker 2: And I think the other thing is please come if you need emergency department care, come to eMERGE. We don't want to turn anybody away inappropriately. If you need care and you think you need to come, come.

Speaker 1: We get it. If you're feeling crummy, that's why you're in the eMERGE. If you're sick, you're hurt or something, and it's easy to get angry and take it out on the people around you, but we're just saying it's not their fault. Right now it's a bigger problem with blocking the outflow from the eMERGE, not the inflow. So keep that in mind.

Speaker 3: Hey, if you like this video, please like it, subscribe to our channel.

Speaker 1: And remember, you are in charge of your own health.

Speaker 3: Thank you so much. Thanks.