Crisis level overcrowding conditions in Emergency Departments (ED's) have led hospitals to seek out new patient flow designs to improve both responsiveness and safety. One approach that has attracted attention and experimentation in the emergency medicine community is a system in which ED beds...

BACKGROUND The 2014 American Heart Association/American College of Cardiology Valvular Heart Disease Guidelines state that mitral valve diseases should be repaired at a Center of Excellence (CoE). We evaluate the cost-effectiveness of such referrals. METHODS We estimate patients’ life...

Hospital Emergency Departments (ED's) typically use triage systems that classify and prioritize patients almost exclusively in terms of their need for timely care. Using a combination of analytic and simulation models, we demonstrate that adding an up-front estimate of patient complexity to...