Affiliations: Department of Medicine, Steward Carney Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
Correspondence:
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Corresponding author: Raman Mehrzad, Department of Medicine, Steward Carney Hospital, 2100 Dorchester Ave, Boston, MA 02124, USA. Tel.: +1 774 240 0060; Fax: +1 617 474 3811; E-mail:yakibha.ram@gmail.com
Abstract:
BACKGROUND: Pagers are the most commonly used method of communications in American hospitals. However, its financial cost and efficiency is unknown.
OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the efficiency of conventional hospital
pagers and to estimate the financial cost of time wasted by the use of these
pagers.
METHODS: We conducted a survey among 100 clinicians, nurses and
pharmacists in our community teaching hospital, estimating the time spent in
the process of sending and responding to pages and the financial equivalent
of this time, and evaluating the potential advantages of hospital-based
wireless telephones compared with traditional pagers.
RESULTS: A total of 70 clinicians completed the survey for a
response rate of 70%. The average time spent per daytime shift in using
the paging system was between 48 and 66 minutes for physicians, 120 minutes
for nurses and 165 minutes for pharmacists. The financial cost of time lost
for a single medical ward for one month was estimated to be $2,732-$17,250,
depending on the case scenario.
CONCLUSIONS: Our study suggests that the traditional paging system
is an inefficient means of communication between clinicians and hospital
staff and that a switch to direct phone calls might be far more
cost-effective. Similar considerations probably apply to most hospitals that
still use traditional pagers.
