Effect of emergency severity index implementation on the waiting time for patients to receive health services in the emergency department

The waiting time for patients in the emergency department to receive health services influences many processes in this department. This research aimed to determine the effect of implementation and deployment of emergency severity index (ESI) on the waiting time for patients to receive health services in the emergency department. This quasi-experimental study was performed on 736 patients who were referred to the emergency department of Imam Khomeini Hospital of Mahabad. For the ESI triage implementation, 368 patients were assigned to the pre-intervention group and 368 patients were selected for the post-intervention group, using a simple random sampling. Before and after the ESI triage implementation, the waiting time for patients to receive services was measured and recorded using a chronometer. For data analysis, Chi-square, Mann-Whitney and Kruskal-Wallis tests were used. Before and after the intervention, both groups were homogeneous in terms of demographic variables (p > 0.05). The results of Mann-Whitney test indicate that implementation of emergency severity index (ESI) has a positive effect on the decrease of average time intervals to provide health services, as well as on the entire length of stay in the emergency department (p < 0.05). Given the effect of the ESI triage implementation that reduced the waiting time for patients to receive health services, ESI is recommended for training nurses and other emergency staff.