Saint John software may reduce ER frustration

A Saint John software developer is hoping to use hospital data to predict emergency room wait times.

"Q-Time" would pull information from emergency room triage to predict how long it will take to see a doctor.

Shawn Peterson, a developer with T4G, said that a recent hospital survey found patients' number one frustration with the ER is not waiting, it’s not knowing how long that wait will be.

He said  the system could also help with hospitals' attempts to manage longer waits.

"Maybe it means calling in additional staff to help relieve the load, maybe it's about doing something different or getting a team together and coming up with a better way to address the issue," Peterson said.

"Instead of finding out a month later that there were issues on a day, we're hoping we can try to spot issues up front and deal with them directly. We're really improving patient care right away."

Peterson is going to the geekfest conference in Toronto on March 7 to showcase his proposal.

He said he has received interest in the idea from Dr. John Dornan, the chief of staff at the Saint John zone of the Horizon Health Network, and Dr. Michael Howlett, head of Emergency Medicine at Saint John Regional Hospital.

"We are looking at a process that was brought to us by T4G looking at asking a series of questions and issues in our hospital and publishing that to … everybody that works here," Dornan said in a video posted to T4G’s website on Thursday.

Peterson said he hopes to see the technology in hospitals across the province.

"Being able to say you're a level three, four, or five priority — here is the estimated wait time in advance — it'll address some of that anxiety of not knowing," he said.

Peterson is also the man behind propertize.ca, where users can compare their property tax assessments with their neighbours.

The site contains easy to find data for the entire province.