Patients at an emergency room in a large urban hospital frequently experience long wait times before they actually see a physician. The hospital has decided to use FMEA to determine an action plan for addressing the problem, defining a “failure” as a wait time of 30 minutes or longer. A group study has produced the following data:

a. Which failure mode has the largest RPN?
b. Provide a suggestion on how to lower the probability of occurrence or impact for each of the three failure modes (causes).

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Cause Peak demand exceeds staff capacity Patient fails to register correctly Patient is placed behind more urgent cases Severity Occurrence 5 5 5 2 5 3 Undetectability 8 1 4