The real problem is data quality: 1) hospitals get rated on 'door to doc' time, so they tie part of compensation to this metric. It is measured based on the tim

The real problem is data quality: 1) hospitals get rated on 'door to doc' time, so they tie part of compensation to this metric. It is measured based on the time when the doc clicks on your name in the computer, which is of course, not the same as when they actually see you, they might physically see you an hour later. 2) Some hospitals have a doc see you in triage. This is great for the hospital's wait time numbers, but they are not going to be responsible for the whole of your care. They usually just order some medications or tests, then you wait for the 'real' doctor to see you, which might take another hour or two. If there is going to be a wait, doing things this way is not necessarily a bad thing, and probably does shorten your overall 'door-to-discharge' time by doing some of the steps in the process in parallel, but the point is that the 'wait time' alone is almost meaningless. 3) the times listed are average times over one year, whereas what you need to make decisions on are realtime wait times