Am I going to wait to death in the emergency room? As of 2006 Americans made 119 million visits to the emergency room- a 32-percent increase since 1996. However, the number of beds and facilities has decreased. Unimpeded, this trend will invite disaster, making hospital administrators yearn for the days where concerns were simply providing quality care with revenues near the black.

Despite the dire predictions, all is not lost. emergency departments must first confront the issues that have long plagued them. Ask any ER Physician about their department and the response will likely be similar to ER Doctor Irv Edwards-“ ...get in a car accident, have a broken leg and end up in the ER, where it takes hours to be treated regardless of our screams. Then we get to diagnosis, and they say, 'There's no orthopedic on call. I'm sorry.'"

Addressing overcrowding and quality of care is not going to be easy for emergency rooms. A study performed by the Picis corporation says that "ED renovation and construction are commonly aimed at easing capacity issues. Without strategies to fix root problems, capacity management remains an issue and continuous expansion is not sustainable, but it is going to be our destiny." So, if emergency rooms cannot build themselves out of this dilemma what can be done?

Ochsner Health System in New Orleans may provide some insight. Ochsner, like many other systems operating emergency rooms dealt with capacity issues until 2005. That year, Hurricane Katrina slammed New Orleans and left fewer options for care in the New Orleans area. As a result the average number of patients per day visiting the system’s main campus increased from 120 to 170. Like many other facilities suffering from overcrowding, Ochsner met the challenge in what some might call a unique way- they leveraged what they already had.

Using their existing Hospital Information Management system Ochsner was able to estimate patient wait times to see a physician in the ED. The times were then posted to their website where they are updated every 30 minutes. At each ER, big screen monitors were installed where patients could monitor wait times for that facility and other facilities in the area.

Dr. Joe Guarisco, chairman of Ochsner's emergency department, indicated during an interview with Fox News that his organization’s five departments always had lop sided patient loads. One facility would have a significant wait while another facility literally down the road would be waiting for patients. After implementing the wait times on the website and in the ER’s, patient load began to balance out. Dr. Guarisco said, “This will sort itself out. But clearly people are moving to the most efficient ED in their minds. That’s what we want them to do."

For most hospitals, 50 percent of all patients are admitted from the emergency room. So how can a hospital keep a healthy bottom line while maintaining quality and quantity? Since we can’t 'build ourselves out the problem' - technology seems to offer the best prospects. Most hospitals already have some varying degree of IT infrastructure in place. These can range from a fully integrated suite of health technologies to simply a website.

With 40 percent of patients using online mediums to make decisions about care Ochsner may be on to something. Consider for a moment the average patient’s experience with hospital information technology when visiting an ER. They might see it during admission, in the waiting room or while receiving care. Ochsner has put a face on their technology for the public and it appears to have been well received.

As the saying goes - 'it's the little things.' Perhaps the answers to increasing quality in the ER have been staring right at us. If the daunting task of balancing patient loads can be alleviated by simply informing the patient on what to expect through existing technology - it's not hard to imagine what other segues leverage like this could produce. Perhaps waiting to death in the ER wouldn't be so painful if you had some idea how long it would be.