Spending hours in an emergency room has been avoided by more than 40 per cent of callers using Health Link, a new study shows.
Bev Williams, registered nurse and associate professor at the University of Alberta, conducted a study into the effectiveness of the service shortly after it was implemented.
“As far as we’re concerned, Health Link provides a pretty important service,” she said. “They handle over a million calls a year so if there was no link, a lot of those people would be seeking family practitioners or emergency departments.”
Health Link is a 24-7 information hotline operated by Alberta Health Services (AHS) that connects patients to registered nurses.
More than 750,000 people use the service on an annual basis, according to Kerry Williamson, spokesperson with AHS.
Of these callers, 15 per cent were sent to the emergency room, 39 per cent were sent to a health care provider and the remaining 46 per cent were advised to self-care.
The patients advised to treat themselves were the focus of the study, which surveyed 312 callers randomly selected each day for nine months in 2007-08.
“We were interested in Health Link because it was a relatively new service when we did the study,” she said. “We found the callers are very satisfied with the advice that Health Link provides — seven out of eight people actually followed the self-care advice that they were given.”
Williams said since 20 per cent of Albertans don’t have family doctors and wait times in hospitals are “tremendously” long, Health Link provides a much-needed alternative.
“If we didn’t have it, I’m sure that visits to family practitioners and emergency departments would be a lot higher than they are currently. There would be a lot more stress in those areas,” she said.
Individuals were more likely to follow the advice given to them if they had a positive interaction with the nurse, she said.
The nurses providing the advice must have the designation of registered nurse and have a minimum of five years experience, Williamson said.
Although the study was conducted a handful of years ago, Williams said she would expect similar findings today.
Individuals using the Internet to self diagnose and self treat injuries or conditions can also be pointed in the right direction by Health Link advisors.
“I would imagine that there might be some callers to Health Link that just want reassurance that they would be okay to do whatever they’re being advised to online,” she said, adding seeking advice from health-care professionals makes the information more reliable.
