An Attempt to Reduce Phone Call Times Between Various Hospital Departments
Document Type
Abstract
Location
Virtual
Start Date
24-4-2026 9:00 AM
End Date
24-4-2026 3:00 PM
Description
This project is focused on decreasing the time residents spend looking up phone numbers for frequently contacted departments. While on in-patient rotations, residents typically spend a significant amount of time attempting to contact various hospital departments. Examples of this include contacting phlebotomy to collect labs, the ekg tech to obtain a STAT EKG, the intensivist fellow to step a patient up to the ICU, radiology to discuss the results of a patient’s scan, and the microbiology lab to review a patient’s culture data. The current process of getting in touch with these departments involves dialing the operator and asking to be connected to a specific department. The resident is then placed on hold while waiting to be connected to the department. Often times the call is disconnected or has to be re-routed multiple times before getting in touch with the appropriate person. This can take a significant amount of time which could be better spent on direct patient care. This project’s objective is to reduce the time spent calling these different hospital departments. Our project will begin by sending an online survey to LSU Internal Medicine Residents. We will ask the residents to time how long it takes to get in touch with various hospital departments and fill out the survey indicating which department they called and the duration of the phone call from dialing to connection with the appropriate department. We will collect this data via an excel spreadsheet. Following the completion of the survey and data collection, we will use the data to create a contact card. The contact card will have the frequently contacted departments listed along with the appropriate extension or contact number. We will distribute these to the LSU Internal Medicine Residents to place on their identification badges for easy accessibility. After the contact cards have been distributed and used for approximately one month, we will send out a follow-up survey. The follow-up survey will ask the resident to time the phone call from dialing to connection with the appropriate department. We will collect this data via an excel spreadsheet. Our prediction is that the contact cards will reduce the time spent getting connected with the appropriate department by at least fifty percent.
Recommended Citation
Pate, Conner and Zulli, Hannah, "An Attempt to Reduce Phone Call Times Between Various Hospital Departments" (2026). Medicine Research Day. 8.
https://digitalscholar.lsuhsc.edu/mrd/2026/qi/8
An Attempt to Reduce Phone Call Times Between Various Hospital Departments
Virtual
This project is focused on decreasing the time residents spend looking up phone numbers for frequently contacted departments. While on in-patient rotations, residents typically spend a significant amount of time attempting to contact various hospital departments. Examples of this include contacting phlebotomy to collect labs, the ekg tech to obtain a STAT EKG, the intensivist fellow to step a patient up to the ICU, radiology to discuss the results of a patient’s scan, and the microbiology lab to review a patient’s culture data. The current process of getting in touch with these departments involves dialing the operator and asking to be connected to a specific department. The resident is then placed on hold while waiting to be connected to the department. Often times the call is disconnected or has to be re-routed multiple times before getting in touch with the appropriate person. This can take a significant amount of time which could be better spent on direct patient care. This project’s objective is to reduce the time spent calling these different hospital departments. Our project will begin by sending an online survey to LSU Internal Medicine Residents. We will ask the residents to time how long it takes to get in touch with various hospital departments and fill out the survey indicating which department they called and the duration of the phone call from dialing to connection with the appropriate department. We will collect this data via an excel spreadsheet. Following the completion of the survey and data collection, we will use the data to create a contact card. The contact card will have the frequently contacted departments listed along with the appropriate extension or contact number. We will distribute these to the LSU Internal Medicine Residents to place on their identification badges for easy accessibility. After the contact cards have been distributed and used for approximately one month, we will send out a follow-up survey. The follow-up survey will ask the resident to time the phone call from dialing to connection with the appropriate department. We will collect this data via an excel spreadsheet. Our prediction is that the contact cards will reduce the time spent getting connected with the appropriate department by at least fifty percent.