Emergency Rooms Offering InQuicker Beat National Wait Time Statistic by 70 Percent

Health IT company cutting on-site wait times in emergency rooms and urgent care centers nationwide

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Jul 11, 2012, 10:14 ET

NASHVILLE, Tenn., July 11, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Do you know the feeling of arriving at your favorite restaurant only to be told that you've got an hour-long wait? Now, imagine being cheerfully greeted by name upon arrival and taken directly to your table. That's the difference between waiting in an ER waiting room and using InQuicker, the online waiting room service for emergency room and urgent care center patients, says company CEO Michael Brody-Waite.

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"We compared the average door-to-provider wait times for thousands of patients using our service against the same type of data from hospitals nationwide, apples to apples," said Brody-Waite. "After waiting from the comfort of home, eight out of 10 patients using InQuicker wait less than 15 minutes in the ER waiting room before seeing a health care provider. Only 18 percent of general ER visitors nationwide are seen within that time frame, and the national door-to-provider average wait time is approximately 50 minutes according to data found in the 2009 National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey results."

InQuicker enables patients with non-life threatening medical conditions to skip the waiting room at the ER and urgent care center. The Nashville-based company is affiliated with 135 emergency rooms and urgent care centers across 20 states. InQuicker provides projected treatment times to patients and enables them to wait from the comfort of home rather than the waiting room. In the event of a delay, InQuicker patients are provided updated projected treatment times via automated phone and email alert.

Widespread closures of emergency departments across the country are placing tremendous pressure on hospitals to maintain high standards of both clinical and non-clinical care in the midst of rapidly growing patient volume. While some health care providers are playing the waiting game, others such as Providence Health Center in Waco, TX are adopting technology to achieve increased patient satisfaction, advanced operational efficiencies, and market differentiation in an evolving health care landscape.

"Since the implementation of InQuicker, we've found that we can move low-acuity patients through our system much faster," said Eileen Bohannon, director of Providence's emergency department. "When patients are not feeling very well, the worst thing they can do is sit in a waiting room. With InQuicker, patients have already done their waiting at home. We can greet them by name when they arrive and have them treated and released very quickly."

The company's study, which is available on the InQuicker blog (http://blog.inquicker.com), cites research from the 2008 and 2009 National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey reports and shows a 6.42% increase in average door-to-provider wait times nationwide between 2007 and 2009. The same research shows that roughly nine out of 10 emergency room visitors nationwide can expect to spend anywhere between zero and 208 minutes in the waiting room before seeing a health care provider.

"The battle for patient mind share, loyalty, and satisfaction begins before they even cross the hospital threshold," said Stacie Pawlicki, InQuicker's Vice President of Marketing. "Without InQuicker, nine out of 10 patients are gambling with the chance of waiting up to three and a half hours in the ER waiting room. With InQuicker, a vast majority of patients spend less time in the ER waiting room than it takes to thumb through a magazine – or drive to a different hospital."

About InQuicker
InQuicker, founded in 2006 and based in Nashville, Tennessee, is the nation's first health IT company to offer an online waiting room that enables patients to skip the waiting room for ER, Urgent Care Center, and Doctor's Office visits. Unlike basic wait time displays, InQuicker provides its users with projected treatment times so they can arrive and be promptly seen by a health care provider and offers instant primary care appointments online.

InQuicker is currently partnered with health care providers in metropolitan areas nationwide, including Atlanta, Austin, Birmingham, Chicago, Denver, Houston, Los Angeles, Memphis, Miami, Oklahoma City, Palm Beach, Philadelphia, San Francisco, and St. Louis.