Overcapacity at Horizon Hospitals Inpatient Occupancy Horizon’s hospitals experience significant, ongoing capacity challenges driven by a large percentage of acute care beds being occupied by patients who no longer require hospital-level care. Many of these patients are awaiting placement in a nursing home or another long-term care setting. These pressures have a direct impact on nearly every corner of the health care system, including Emergency Department wait times and the timely admission of new patients. It also means care may be delivered in hallways, dining areas, lounges – conditions that are far from ideal for patients, families and staff. While our hospital staff often go above and beyond – offering recreation, connection, and encouragement –hospitals simply aren’t designed to provide the kind of daily therapy and social support these individuals need. Horizon is working closely with government partners to address this situation and ensure these patients waiting for alternate care can be safely discharged and placed in an appropriate long-term care facility as quickly as possible. Our organization is committed to accountability and transparency and ensuring our patients, clients and the public have access to information that will help keep them up to date. Measuring and reviewing key indicators is one way we can identify goals and monitor our progress in delivering the best possible health care services to New Brunswickers. Weekly Inpatient Monitoring Report The below dashboard will be updated every Tuesday while inpatient occupancy rates remain at current levels: Definitions of the key indicators included in this dashboard: % ALC Occupying Hospital Bed: Percentage of the total funded acute care beds that are occupied by patients waiting for alternate care. These patients are sometimes known as alternate level of care or ALC. It is calculated by dividing the daily number of these patients by the total number of funded beds. Total Hospital Occupancy (%): Percentage of a facility’s total staffed beds that are occupied by inpatients. It is calculated by dividing the daily number of patients by the total number of beds in the facility. Number of Patients Waiting for Nursing Home Placement: Represents the number of admitted patients whose care needs have been assessed at a level appropriate for nursing home care. These patients could be immediately discharged and placed in a nursing home if a bed were available. Number of Patients Discharged to Nursing Homes: The weekly total number of patients that have been discharged from hospital and placed in a nursing home. Crowded wait rooms in emergency departments When our hospitals are overcapacity, patients and clients may experience long wait times in our emergency departments. Please be assured patients and clients requiring urgent medical attention are always seen first. People who present at an emergency department are assessed by a registered nurse who triages patients based on the Canadian Triage and Acuity Scale (CTAS). This is a nationally recognized tool used to assist health care providers in prioritizing the order in which patients need to be seen. All emergency departments across Horizon use this scale. It is a five-point scale with CTAS Level 1 being a resuscitation and CTAS Level 5 being a non-urgent visit. Patients with non-urgent care needs (Level 5) who are waiting for their names to be called may not realize that patients requiring resuscitation or emergency care (Levels 1 and 2) are coming in via ambulance. Patients and clients are reminded to consult their family physician, nurse practitioner, pharmacist, Tele-Care 811 or walk-in clinic for non-urgent medical needs. For more information, visit SoWhyWait.ca. Longer wait times to find a bed For patients and clients who are seen in the ED and need to be admitted into one of our facilities, it may take us some time to find a bed. Horizon staff meet daily to discuss admissions and discharges, and work to find solutions to find appropriate space for all our patients. Horizon’s health care teams may consider placing a patient in another Horizon facility if necessary. Cancelled surgeries There is often a shortage of beds due to overcapacity issues within our hospitals. This means elective surgical procedures may be cancelled if there are no beds available for post-operative/recovery care. We understand this is difficult for patients and their families who have made arrangements to accommodate their surgeries. We do everything within our control to ensure surgeries scheduled in advance are not cancelled. When they are, we work with the patient and the operating room (OR) team to find an alternate date as soon as possible. Emergency surgeries will always be a priority. For more information: We encourage patients, clients, family members, and loved ones who have concerns about their level of care, support or assistance to contact our Patient Representative Services either by calling 1-844-225-0220, online, or in person. For media inquiries including requests for interviews and overcapacity statistics by facility, please contact the Senior Communications Advisor – Media, Media@HorizonNB.ca or 1-877-499-1899.