Hospital emergency rooms are overcrowded because uninsured patients have nowhere else to turn. Right? Wrong says a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Hospital emergency rooms are indeed jammed. But its not for the reason proponents of nationalized health care suggest.
Researchers found most ERs are packed because more patients of all kinds -- insured and uninsured -- are choosing to visit them. Further ER patients are being kept there longer than necessary when they should often be checked in or treated in a doctors office.
Moreover in conducting the first study of its kind researchers discovered that other scholarly papers on the uninsured simply assumed that they are the principal cause of emergency department (ED) overcrowding:
• Among the 127 identified articles 53 had at least 1 assumption about uninsured ED patients with a mean of 3 assumptions per article.
• Common assumptions include hypotheses that increasing numbers of uninsured patients present to the ED and that uninsured patients lack access to primary care.
• Available data support statements that ED care is more expensive than office-based care and this is true for all users insured and uninsured.
• It doesnt support assumptions that uninsured patients are a primary cause of ED overcrowding present with less acute conditions than insured patients or seek ED care primarily for convenience.
In fact Devon Herrick a senior fellow with the National Center for Policy Analysis blamed those carrying government insurance for much of the overcrowding of emergency rooms.
Its not the uninsured who burden Americas emergency rooms so much as it is people who are carrying government insurance policies says Herrick. The low reimbursement rates mean very few will accept taxpayer-funded insurance any more leaving those on government plans to visit ERs for care instead of primary-care physicians.
Source: Editorial Shocker! Uninsured not jamming emergency rooms World Net Daily March 9 2009; based upon: Manya F. Newton et al. Uninsured Adults Presenting to U.S. Emergency Departments Journal of the American Medical Association Vol. 300 No. 16 October 22-29 2008.
For text:
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=91258
Hospital emergency rooms are overcrowded because uninsured patients have nowhere else to turn. Right? Wrong says a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Hospital emergency rooms are indeed jammed. But its not for the reason proponents of nationalized health care suggest.
Researchers found most ERs are packed because more patients of all kinds -- insured and uninsured -- are choosing to visit them. Further ER patients are being kept there longer than necessary when they should often be checked in or treated in a doctors office.
Moreover in conducting the first study of its kind researchers discovered that other scholarly papers on the uninsured simply assumed that they are the principal cause of emergency department (ED) overcrowding:
• Among the 127 identified articles 53 had at least 1 assumption about uninsured ED patients with a mean of 3 assumptions per article.
• Common assumptions include hypotheses that increasing numbers of uninsured patients present to the ED and that uninsured patients lack access to primary care.
• Available data support statements that ED care is more expensive than office-based care and this is true for all users insured and uninsured.
• It doesnt support assumptions that uninsured patients are a primary cause of ED overcrowding present with less acute conditions than insured patients or seek ED care primarily for convenience.
In fact Devon Herrick a senior fellow with the National Center for Policy Analysis blamed those carrying government insurance for much of the overcrowding of emergency rooms.
Its not the uninsured who burden Americas emergency rooms so much as it is people who are carrying government insurance policies says Herrick. The low reimbursement rates mean very few will accept taxpayer-funded insurance any more leaving those on government plans to visit ERs for care instead of primary-care physicians.
Source: Editorial Shocker! Uninsured not jamming emergency rooms World Net Daily March 9 2009; based upon: Manya F. Newton et al. Uninsured Adults Presenting to U.S. Emergency Departments Journal of the American Medical Association Vol. 300 No. 16 October 22-29 2008.
For text:
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=91258
