Comment

Romney: If You Can't Afford Insurance, Just Go to the Emergency Room

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lawhawk9/24/2012 11:32:52 am PDT

As I posted on the dead thread, one of the reasons for sky high health costs and hospitals that are on the brink of insolvency is an overreliance on the ER for delivering health care that is better provided at a primary care provider or an urgent care center outside of a hospital ER.

A hospital ER is meant to deal with critical care patients - those who have fractures, heart attacks, serious illnesses, etc.

It’s not for getting scripts for strep throat or regular immunizations or other basic health care.

According to the CDC (2011 data for ages 18-64), nearly 80% of ER visits are because of lack of access to another provider. The most common reasons for the last emergency room visit were only a hospital could help (54.5%), the doctor’s office was not open (48.0%), or there was no other place to go (46.3%). Those living outside metro areas were more likely to go to ER than those in urban settings where there were other providers available.

Uninsured adults were more likely to visit the emergency room because they had no other place to go at the time of the last visit (61.6%), compared with adults having private insurance (38.9%) or those with public health plan coverage (48.5%)

ER visits rose at higher rates than other health care costs.

And some states have higher ER utilization than others. Ohio (a battleground state) is at the high end of the spectrum, while CA and HI are at the low end - on a per capita basis.