Niagara Health aims to reduce emergency wait times by focusing on repeat patients

Niagara Health is now using Familiar Faces—a program aimed at reducing emergency department wait times by addressing the care needs of patients who are frequent visitors. Many of these patients have sought care in emergency departments for non-urgent medical needs, or have concerns “better suited to other forms of healthcare,” according to a release from Niagara Health, a regional health network in Ontario that consists of hospitals in Fort Eerie, Niagara Falls, Port Colborne, St. Catharines and Welland. Niagara Health noted examples: a patient who does not have a family doctor and who needs a prescription refill; and a person living with dementia who is “scared and confused” with no family to help them. “There are people frequently returning to our emergency departments who are not in an emergency situation,” Debby Schaubel, senior project manager for Familiar Faces, said in the release. “Do they need care? Absolutely, that’s undeniable. But some of these repeat patients have complex care requirements that the emergency department is simply not equipped to deal with.” Niagara Health staff have been working on this initiative since 2021, tracking the top 200 patients who most frequently visit the emergency department. In the past year, emergency departments in the region have seen a total of more than 185,000 patient visits, according to the release. In 2022, 3,700 of those patients visited an emergency department more than five times, representing approximately 25,000 patient visits. The Familiar Faces program involves embedding social workers in emergency departments and having them collaborate with other existing healthcare providers in the community. “That includes community care resources such as primary care partners, community care clinics, and chronic disease management programs,” reads the release. In addition to alleviating ER wait times, the goal of the program is to “provide a holistic approach of care to Niagara’s patients with complex care needs,” Niagara Health noted. “We want to find a way to ensure those patients are getting continuity of care and the type of community-based care that would serve them better, while also alleviating some of the pressures from the emergency department,” the program's chair Dr. Shira Brown said.

Niagara Health aims to reduce emergency wait times by focusing on repeat patients

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