Who hasn't endured a seemingly interminable stint in a hospital waiting room while a loved one is examined and treated? With cellphone and Blackberry use a no-no and nothing but archaic magazines to entertain people, it's one of life's more tedious necessities.

But when his fiancée suffered through that scenario for seven hours after he broke his shoulder last year, Toronto resident Daniel Pustil began wondering how to alleviate it.

A few months later, the answer arrived while he was watching a movie based in Spain.

"All these people were using Internet terminals in what looked like an ER waiting room," Pustil recalls. "And, suddenly, I'm like 'Why don't we have that here in hospitals just the way we have banks of payphones?' " Acting on his eureka moment, he discovered that there are few such Internet terminals in U.S. hospitals and only one in Canada, at North Vancouver's Lion's Gate Hospital.

Brennan O'Connor, Business Edge
Lee Kaufman, left, and Daniel Pustil are bringing the Internet to Toronto-area hospitals with their While You Wait kiosks.

Recognizing a ground-floor opportunity with potential, Pustil quit his day job as an Oshawa builder last summer. He then launched While You Wait, with himself as company president and his cousin, York University MBA graduate Lee Kaufman, as chief operating officer.

A deal was struck with a Florida supplier to purchase Internet kiosks similar to those Pustil had seen in the film, plus the appropriate software, for approximately $8,000 per unit.

With 17-inch screens, the kiosks can be used while standing or sitting in a chair or wheelchair. The software contains filters and firewalls to preclude access to X-rated sites.

The duo then began approaching Toronto hospitals, pitching their kiosks as a communications tool and thus an antidote to mind-numbing tedium.

Instead of feeling trapped, bored and unable to handle routine chores, people can log on to While You Wait terminals to send and receive e-mail or search for news or diversion.

At a base rate of 35 cents per minute or 20 minutes for $5, with payment by coins or major credit card, the cost for users is minimal. But with a cut of 18 per cent on each transaction, the revenue stream for cash-strapped hospitals is potentially hefty.

And, says Pustil: "We guaranteed the hospitals that there would be no labour on their part whatsoever. We would buy the machines, install them, set up the phone line with Bell, and maintain and service them. Plus, our 800 number is prominently displayed so people who have questions won't bug the nurses."

That staff would not become "de facto service attendants" was an important part of the decision to give the kiosks a try, says Harvey Naglie, vice-president of business development at Mount Sinai Hospital.

His is one of the two Toronto hospitals in which While You Wait has installed the units so far.

A kiosk went into use at Mount Sinai's fracture room in January and Naglie says all concerned "have been very, very pleased. Like the Hippocratic Oath says: 'First, do no harm.' These machines have certainly done no harm and the feedback we're getting is all positive. Now that we know they operate painlessly and seamlessly, we're looking to add two more kiosks - one in our emergency room and one in our obstetrics/gynecology area.

"The point is that, notwithstanding our best efforts to keep waiting times as short as possible, there are occasions when people have to sit around for a while before we can address their problems," Naglie adds. "So, if we can make the consumer experience a little less anxious and a little more pleasant than it would otherwise be, we view that as a definite opportunity."

Gerry Dimnik, director of information services at North York General Hospital, concurs with Naglie, although he says no decision has yet been made about adding more Internet kiosks.

"We currently have two located in (both) our emergency and surgical waiting rooms," he says. "They're mostly being used by visitors to check their e-mail and do other essential things, and we're not hearing any complaints about them not working well."

Users of While You Wait terminals may be even happier in the future because the service will be free if there is enough sponsorship by advertisers, says Pustil.

"Millions of people pass through hospitals, and even if they don't use our kiosks, they might well see the 11x17-inch billboards above the screens."

"Right now, we're just using the billboards to advertise our company," he says. "But, down the road, we'll be approaching, say, Shoppers Drug Mart or Second Cup or maybe the Toronto Blue Jays. So our billboards could say something like: 'This Internet service is brought to you by whoever.' Plus, we'll put a link to their websites onscreen. But we certainly won't be including anything unhealthy like cigarettes or alcohol."

While working on that potentially lucrative wrinkle, Pustil and Kaufman are awaiting decisions from several other area hospitals that are considering having Internet kiosks installed.

These include Toronto's General, Western, Scarborough Grace and Sick Children's hospitals and Barrie's Royal Victoria Hospital.

The hospital waiting rooms are only one segment of Pustil's marketing plan, however.

"Our big, big play once we get a couple more hospitals, is to approach medical centres where there are maybe 20 dentists and 20 doctors, and offer a desktop version of the machine.

"Then, after that, we may go into places like Mr. Lube - anywhere where people have to wait around and could put their time to better use."

How do While You Wait's principals feel about pursuing their lemon-into-lemonade opportunity?

"We're very excited and yet we're very nervous," says Pustil. "We know this could be huge, especially if we branch out of hospitals and out of Ontario.

"Once we get known, competitors will probably try to get in on the action. But we know we're doing a good thing and we enjoy saying to ourselves: 'You know what? Six months ago, this didn't even exist,' " he says.

(Terry Poulton can be reached at poulton@businessedge.ca)