More data for the "please don't immediately recommend the ER" cause

[feckalyn.livejournal.com]

Friendly mod post here y'all~

Some of you know about my crusade to try to limit the use of our dwindling Emergency Rooms to true emergencies only. Here's my last post on the matter.

Anyway, the CDC released a report on the status of Emergency Department use in the US this week. And the news isn't great.

"A record 114 million Americans visited a hospital emergency room in 2003, despite a steady decline in the number of E.R. facilities available nationwide, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a report issued Thursday.

While E.R. visits shot up 26 percent over the decade from 1993 to 2003, the number of emergency department facilities fell 14 percent over that span."

See more in the CDC's report.

So when you see fellow vp-ers asking for medical advice, please refer them to a local ask-a-nurse line (usually available though community hospitals) or their personal medical provider rather than the ER. I know I want to have access to ER care when I'm having a medical emergency and I'm sure you do too, but if we keep misusing them they aren't going to be there when we need them!

Comments

[sparklesistah.livejournal.com]

You have to get a referral? Wow, I don't think i've ever seen the same doctor twice. If I need to see a doc, I get a choice of who is on that day and when they're available, and I pick one that's most convenient for me. Seems like a better way to do things, I mean they all get my file with the same info in it heh :)