How do I minimize or inform users of connection lag?

How do I minimize or inform users of connection lag?

I'm maintaining a ASP/C# program that uses an MS SQL Server 2008 R2 for
its database requirements.
On normal and perfect days, everything works fine as it is. But we don't
live in a perfect world, do we?
An Application (Leave, Sick Leave, Overtime, Undertime, etc.) Approval
process requires up to ten separate connections to the database. The
program uses stored procedures to do the work.
Now, due to the structure of the entire thing, which I can not change, a
dip in the connection, or heck, if I put a debug point in VS2005 and let
it hand there long enough, the Application Approval Process goes
incomplete. The tables are often just joined together, so a data mismatch
- a missing data here, a primary key that failed to update there - would
mean an entire row would be useless.
Now, I know that there is nothing I can do to prevent this. But are there
ways to minimize it? Or at the very least, a way to inform the users that
something went wrong with the process?
Thanks.