As he has done for several days now, Gov. Baker used part of his daily press conference today to urge people with non-Covid-19 health issues to call their doctors or 911. But this time, he was joined by executives at three hospitals, who reported many people are trying to wait out symptoms at home, which means they eventually come into the hospital far sicker - and sometimes beyond help. Read more.
Patients needing emergency care at Newton-Wellesley Hospital now have an easy way to find out how long the ER wait is- before they actually get there. The Hospital is introducing three new innovative tools for its patients: an Emergency Room (ER) wait time display on the Newton-Wellesley website, a Hospital iPhone application available on iTunes for download and a mobile version of the website available for many smartphones.
Newton-Wellesley Hospital has already begun displaying the current average ER wait times on the hospital's website, www.nwh.org. The ER wait time is automatically updated every five minutes and represents the average time it takes for a patient to be placed into a treatment room to be seen by the ER practitioner on duty. Patients are triaged on arrival by a registered nurse and are then seen by an emergency medicine provider based on severity. Those determined to require immediate attention will go directly to a room. The service is meant for patients with urgent complaints, but not for those with life-threatening emergencies.
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