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

[sogn.livejournal.com]

No, I would need a referral to go to an urgent care center, or else the insurance company wouldn't pay for it. Basically they say that if you can't wait to go to your primary care doctor, you should go to an emergency room.

Yes, it makes absolutely no sense.

[unwanted4ever.livejournal.com]

I also have an HMO and my doctor has been in india for a month, and i was throwing up every time i ate for about two weeks, and it was'nt the flu so i tried going to another doctor and they said i needed a referral and i was like "well where the hell do i go?" and they told me to go to the express emergency (which is like the ER for people with problems that aren't as severe)and my costs were completely covered.

[lottasmiles.livejournal.com]

Well, that really surprises me. I am not doubting you, but after working in insurance for quite some time I have just never heard of that. I've always seen that ERs and Urgent Care centers are covered in the same way, they just take different cases. That's why they are usually attached and some ppl entering the ER end up in urgent care and never even notice.

Some HMOs do prefer/require a call into their center first or to an advice nurse, but going to an urgent care center that works with your covered ER should not be a problem. I'd bitch a fit if it was. I'm sorry your insurance is so tight in policy.