Sapphire magazine Stevenson Memorial hospital diagnostic imaging

By: Brian Lockhart

Life in the emergency room of a hospital has been the focus of countless television shows and movies, but the reality of needing emergency help is totally different when you're the one in the waiting room.
Forget the soap opera tales, the truth is the staff who work in the Emergency
Department at Stevenson Memorial Hospital are dedicated, well trained professionals who are there to help you.
"We had around 27,000 visits to the emergency room last year," says Shannon Landry, Stevenson's Chief Nursing Executive.
People arrive at the ER with everything from mild complaints like a sore throat, to more serious injuries and life threatening illnesses.
Stevenson has strived to improve the time in which patients are treated.
This includes a newly redesigned triage area and a 'fast track' system that allows patients with low acuity
ailments to be treated in a clinic type atmosphere.
Low acuity treatment would include relatively minor illnesses or injuries.
The new triage area is designed to improve the 'flow' through the department.
Triage, Landry explains, is "a system to assess a patient quickly and determine
a level of acuity."
In other words, a person assessed to have a serious injury or illness that requires immediate attention would be treated before a person with an ailment of a less serious nature.
"The triage scale goes from 'one to five' with 'one' being the most serious."
The changes Stevenson has incorporated in its triage area and throughout the emergency department have helped to improve the care the Hospital provides to its patients.
"Over the course of the past year and throughout the change process, we have
been focusing our efforts on our patient satisfaction rates. In fact, 87 per cent
of our patients have rated the emergency department experience as a positive
one," said Landry. "The average time for patients to see a physician has been on average three hours. We will continue to look for ways to improve our processes to help us ensure our patients are satisfied with the care they receive."
After 35 years in health care, ER nurse Doris Comtois has pretty much seen it all when it comes to the daily operations of a hospital. "It keeps our skills sharp. You never know what you're going to have from day to day," She says of the different cases that come through Stevenson's emergency room on a daily basis.
After graduating nursing school, Doris went on to take more courses to become a coronary nurse then followed up with additional training in emergency nursing care.
"We have three nurses in emergency at night, and people come from all over.
It makes for a very busy place." she explains.
Her experience means she can differentiate between a patient with less
serious symptoms and a person who needs immediate attention.
"You have to be in nursing for a while to get to know the different symptoms,
and who is the most serious," Doris explains of working in triage. Then "you make a decision" on who needs to be treated first.
It's a stressful job - one that deals with many tragic circumstances.
"We take care of the critically ill, support families in very emotional situations
and continue to provide care to all of the patients that come into the ER. We all support each other," Doris says of the ER staff. "There are a lot of other people
out there that are counting on you."
Can you prepare for a visit to the emergency room?
Considering most emergencies are obviously of an unplanned nature, most
likely your visit will also be unplanned.
But both Shannon and Doris stressed that there is one thing you can do to help both the attending physician and yourself - know any medication you are currently taking. "Bring all your medications with you if you can," says Landry. "Or at least a list of the medications you are taking."
That information means that effective treatment can be started sooner and get
you the help you need.