Four area hospitals got cash to cut wait times

Four hospitals in the Waterloo Wellington Local Health Integration Net­work will receive cash from the province’s $100-million emergency department Pay for Results initiative.

This is the third year it is providing cash to reduce the time pati­ents spend in emergency. Seventy-one hospitals received funding.

Locally, Cambridge Mem­orial, Grand River, Guelph General, and St. Mary’s Gen­eral Hospitals got money.

Cambridge and Guelph are getting cash for the first time through the initiative - $782,100 and $776,000 respectively. Grand River has been allocated $935,400 this year and St. Mary’s receives $764,500. It was one of seven hos­pitals in the province that received a one-time perfor­mance bonus for exceeding expectations. It received $530,000 for achieving a 23 per cent waiting time improvement for all emergency patients over the previous year.

Patients are wait­ing on average 1 hour and 20 minutes less in emergency to be treated, compared to last year.

The hospitals were selected to be the first across the pro­vince to parti­cipate in the improvement program.

It foc­uses on change management (customized for health care) and streamlining and improving procedures and processes to reduce waiting times.