Remember when national health care was going to finally clear our emergency rooms? It has not exactly worked out that way, particularly in California. While there are clearly other benefits from national health care, the hope that people would turn to regular medical visits rather than ER visits has not materialized in California where the average wait time is five and a half hours. An astonishing 57% of patients left before seeing a doctor due to the delay — that constitutes roughly 352,000 persons leaving without fully addressing their medical conditions.
Emergency room visits grew 20 percent from 2012 to 2017. That translates to an additional 2.4 million patients on top of the already over-taxed hospitals.
Given the hundreds of billions spent on health care, it is incredible to think of having to sit for an average of 5 1/2 hours to just see a doctor. What is worse, the wait times are even longer in four states — Maryland, New York, New Jersey and Delaware.
I have been critical of our health care system for years, particularly with the ridiculously high medical and drug prices. The horror stories of absurd medical bills are now routine. The question is what he have gotten from hundreds of billions of dollars in the most expensive health care system in the world.
Disappointed that Turley misstated the source article…. the KHN article states 352,000 people left hospital after seeing doctor, but before their medical care was finished. That number was UP 57% over the five-year period.
In total, ER visits were up 2.4mln, or 20%, which implies around 12+Mln ER visits for 2017. The article states around 2% of people leave the hospital without seeing a doctor, or against medical advice. Nowhere near 50%.
The point about ER visits going up is still valid, but maybe more thorough presentation of the actual numbers 🙂