Competing values of emergency department performance: balancing multiple stakeholder perspectives.
OBJECTIVE
To describe the performance interests of multiple stakeholders associated with the management and delivery of emergency department (ED) care, and to develop a performance framework and set of indicators that reflect these interests.


METHODS
Stakeholders (1,100 physicians, nurses, managers, home care providers, and prehospital care personnel) with responsibility for ED patients in hospitals in the Canadian province of Ontario.


METHODS
Sixty-two percent of stakeholders responded to a mail survey regarding the importance of 104 potential ED performance indicators. Descriptive and inferential statistics are used to explore the interests of each stakeholder group and to compare interests across the five groups.


RESULTS
Emergency department stakeholders are primarily interested in indicators that focus on their role and capacity to provide care. Key differences exist between hospital and nonhospital stakeholders. Physicians mean ratings of the importance on ED performance measures were lower than mean ratings in the other stakeholder groups.


CONCLUSIONS
Emergency department performance interests are not homogeneous across stakeholder groups, and evaluating performance from the perspective of any one stakeholder group will result in unbalanced assessments. Community-based stakeholders, a group frequently excluded from commenting on ED performance, provide important insights into ED performance related to the external environment and the broader continuum of care.
Tregunno
Deborah
D
Canadian Health Services Research Foundation Post Doctoral Fellow, University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Ross Baker
G
G
Barnsley
Jan
J
Murray
Michael
M
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D016001:Confidence Intervals; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D003659:Decision Making, Organizational; D017598:Efficiency, Organizational; D004636:Emergency Service, Hospital / Q000592:standards*; D005260:Female; D019538:Health Care Surveys; D006740:Hospital Administrators / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008505:Medical Staff, Hospital / Q000523:psychology*; D008875:Middle Aged; D009864:Ontario; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care; D019984:Quality Indicators, Health Care; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires