Describe Return on Investment:
Return on investment is an analytical model that estimates an intervention’s tangible and indirect costs and compares that to the costs or cost savings of an expected outcome. (Sah et al., 2022). To stay competitive and provide high-quality care, hospitals need to reduce patient wait times and length of stay while delivering care at an unparalleled value. Timely referral to specialized geriatric care has improved throughput efficiency without increasing resources (Silverster et al., 2014). In 2021 Hwang et al. determined that providing specialized geriatric care in the emergency department resulted in a per-person medicare beneficiary savings of up to $3,431 (Hwang et al., 2021).  

Three Resources Required For My DNP Project:
* 4 Geriatric Emergency Nurse Practitioners: These Nurse Practitioners will provide emergent age-specific interventions to mitigate the risks of long admission length of stay. The cost of this resource is approximately $500,000 annually.
* 1 Attending Geriatric Attending Physician: This Attending physician will oversee the Geriatric Emergency Nurse Practitioner Program part-time. The cost of this resource is approximately $100,000 annually.
* Data Analytic Team: Members of this team will provide the detailed reports and electronic chart automation required to identify high-risk geriatric patients. The approximate cost of this team’s time is $10,000 annually.

Justifying the Use of the Resources:
The total cost of this program is approximately $610,000 annually. As mentioned earlier, geriatric-specific care provided in the Emergency Department can decrease the cost of care by $3,431 per patient. Therefore, the Geriatric Emergency Department Nurse Practitioners only need to consult 177 admitted geriatric emergency department patients annually to break even. This team’s capacity for work is much greater than this, and the expected return on investment can easily be fivefold. Additionally, my project will determine if Geriatric Emergency Nurse practitioners can effectively lower admission length of stay. If this proves to be accurate, this will increase the patient capacity for the hospital and yields more revenue opportunities. Lastly, decreasing admission length of stay will decrease the occurrences of patient harm, which many consider invaluable.