title: Strategic emergency department design: An approach to capacity planning in healthcare provision in overcrowded emergency rooms.
abstract: Healthcare professionals and the public have increasing concerns about the ability of emergency departments to meet current demands. Increased demand for emergency services, mainly caused by a growing number of minor and moderate injuries has reached crisis proportions, especially in the United Kingdom. Numerous efforts have been made to explore the complex causes because it is becoming more and more important to provide adequate healthcare within tight budgets. Optimisation of patient pathways in the emergency department is therefore an important factor.This paper explores the possibilities offered by dynamic simulation tools to improve patient pathways using the emergency department of a busy university teaching hospital in Switzerland as an example.
authors.affiliation: Department of Emergency Medicine, Inselspital-University Hospital, Bern, 3010 Bern, Switzerland. aristomenis@exadaktylos.ch.
authors.forename: Aristomenis K
authors.initials: AK
authors.lastname: Exadaktylos
authors.forename: Dimitrios S
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Evangelopoulos
authors.forename: Marcel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Wullschleger
authors.forename: Leo
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Bürki
authors.forename: Heinz
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Zimmermann