I know the meaning of an EMERGENCY varies considerably from person to person, but an ER is for EMERGENCIES. This means, you go there when your life is in DANGER and you could die.
You don’t go for a shallow CUT, the FLU, a COLD, because you’re PREGNANT and especially not ABDOMINAL PAIN after you just consumed 1000 calories of something called “FOOD” but now is LAVA in your gut. (Go sit on the toilet for several hours and suffer alone).
You DO go when you have diarrhea, can’t stop throwing up and are dehydrated.
You DO go when you are bleeding heavily from a large gash or cut off a digit or limb.
You DO go when you have a fever that won’t go down after 48h after taking acetaminophen or ibuprofen aka. Tylenol or Advil —wear a mask for god’s sake, don’t spread your germs—
You DO go if you cannot BREATHE and have chest pain.
You DO go if you suddenly went blind or deaf or dizzy or can’t speak suddenly.
Let up on our ER staff please, go visit your family doctor, or walk in clinic, they are for NON-EMERGENCY things. And if the doctor refers you to the ER for a non-emergency, tell the doc he/she won’t get paid for this visit as you will write MSI and tell them he/she did not provide a service. —Not a health care worker
This article appears in Jun 3-9, 2010.
moral of the story I guess here is … if you break your leg… you can’t go to the ER until you cut it off.
right…
or you can use your head… because obviously a broken leg isn’t serious..
moron
And i suppose if you`re convulsing from a seizure or have extreme hypo glycemia or hyper glycemia (i.e. you`re about to go into a coma) or you`re yellow because you have a blocked bile duct and are in searing pain from the gallbladder attack (and need emergency surgery) you should just drive yourself to the walk in clinics.
Sounds reasonable.
those sound serious and could go on the “you DO go list”…
you’ll use your head when the time comes, right now is the exception though 🙂
the stupid things people go to the ER for.
all fictious scenarios:
——————————————-
“i need blood work done”
————————————————————-
“I just threw up”… (hold and comfort me)
——————————————
“i have the flu, can i get antibiotics?”
“antibiotics are for infections, there is no known cure for a virus, go home and sleep and let your white blood cells do their job, stay out of public, you are contagious.”
——————————————
“I have stomach pain”
“when did you eat last?”
“an hour ago”
“what/where did you eat?”
“A&W”
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“I can’t breathe well and have chest pain”
“what were you doing?”
“shovelling snow”
“how much do you smoke?”
“a pack a day”
“you should stop sm…….”
“i know i know just gimmie some O2 and i’ll go home”
even worse like try to get a doctors appointment cause of all the old people clogging up the doctors office; hey old people i’ll make a prognosis …. your old that’s whats wrong with you 🙂
martym, that’s actually not a bad point. Once you hit a certain age ( 70’s 0r 80’s ) aging becomes its own disease process.
People should not be using the emergency room as a primary health care provider, its unfortunate but a staggering number of people ( me included i am sad to say ) do not have a regular general practitioner in this city.
I’d like to say that there are plenty of GPs in this city accepting new patients. Problem is, it’s not advertised well, and the hospital staff don’t actually promote this crazy service that actually sets you up with a GP: http://www.gov.ns.ca/health/physicians/
The aging population also puts significant stress on GPs, and on walk-in clinics, especially. When I want to see my GP, I usually have to book a 2-3 days in advance, and if it’s something problematic, that can be a serious issue, like the back spasms that I’ve been having for the past week, only to be referred to the hospital for x-rays.
So, what do you do when you can’t go to a GP, the walk-in clinic doctor is about as competent as Dr. Nick Riviera (which is a terrifying reality for most walk-ins)? You go to the ER.
i would guess everyone knows o.p., but no one really cares if it isn’t. any ole port in a storm, you know.
cptstupid
I was just using the ‘rules’ (or DO’s) enforced by our hospital nazi here….
if they aren’t exhaustive, then why bother posting just some of them?
I mean, how are we… the idiotic public …. that the OP (perhaps you?) is complaining about supposed to know? We obviously don’t since the bitch is in existence.
we need clearly defined rules to tell us that our sniveling nose isn’t quite as urgent as that guy with a knife sticking out of his leg. Were it obvious, we wouldn’t have people going to the ER for A&W pains and throw up comfort.
I think walk-ins are pretty much the go-to spot… since (as has been stated) you can almost never get in with your doc immediately.
I’d rather sit and wait for 4 hours and get some meds for … oh… kidney stones or something like that…. than book an appointment with a Dr and wait 2 days with agonizing and unrelenting crotch and abdominal pain.
People who abuse the health care system with pointless injuries should be fined!
How the fuck do you get an appointment within two days of calling your doctor!? Anytime I’ve called my doctor I have to wait at least a week!! Sometimes more when he’s on vacation. Or I could go to the lovely duty doctor who doesn’t even look at you and says you’re fine. I went into one with a broken toe, he glanced at it and gave me a prescription for some sort of cream to put on it. Now my toe is all deformed :D!
my doc in clayton park is a fucking one, busy as hell, but if i need her, call in and i’m usually in and out of her office in less than 2 hours. and that’s for just minor shit, serious stuff, she would have a med. bus there to transport. she is one hell of a doctor.
My GP is in a mid-sized office; he’s got about 4 other doctors in the practice with him, all Canadian educated, and extremely competent. So, even if my doctor was busy, I could see somebody, thanks to that.
Admittedly, I only have him because he’s my wife’s GP (who in turn was referred to him after her breast cancer), but the office is always accepting new patients, and the website I posted is very useful.
The fact remains that way too many people use the ER for all the wrong reasons. Big thumbs up to the ER staff. One of the most stress filled jobs that exist.
Obviously the op has never had a gallbladder attack. I had one, an hour or 2 after eating too much spinach dip. (For the record I’m 5 ft 5 and 120lbs so don’t go assuming I’m a fatty who can’t control herself).
I ended up in the hospital for 12hrs or so, in searing pain.
Just curious op – are you a doctor? Nurse? Or someone who just assumes they know everything about everyone else in the waiting room?
I like the system they’ve got now.
You show up at an Emerg & they triage you & then if you are an emergency, in you go.
If your not, the wait begins ~:D
.
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& waiting
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still waiting ,
I love it.
If it was me & someone came in with a nonemergency problem, I’d see if I could get them to wait 12 hours or more. Which would be just perfect for someone who’s eaten too much, after 12 hours, they’ll be hungry again & would walk out…maybe they’d be back after they’ve eaten .
The OP’s probably one of those ever-so-lovely piss ant orderlies that when you ask for directions, they grunt and begrudgingly comply.
those are the same folks i worked with at the hotel…grunting sighing drones
halicowton — the best thing I found to cure gallbladder attack pain is to barf. A lot. I’d barf up a shitton of bile and I’d feel better. The bile would rip my throat to shreds and I’d have problems talking for a few days, but it was worth it :|
Gallbladder attacks are HELL. I’ve had them and I’ve had mine out — my mom also had her’s out and she said the initial attack was worse than being in labour. I had my attacks for 10 years and didn’t know what they were and they were awful.
DISCLAIMER…pk does not endorse medical claims made here
I wouldn’t say its set in stone when and when not to use the ER. I had a friend a while back who lost his mom because they thought she had the flu because of her symptoms, but whatever it was ending up killing her. So for someone to say things like abdominal pain and flu-like symptoms are not cause for concern, is quite wrong. Abdominal pain could be a miscarriage or eating poorly. Having a fever could be a common cold or about a billion other serious things.
I do agree though, the ER is clogged with a bunch of BS, but what can you do other than make it mandatory for everyone to become a doctor?
If you really aren’t sure whether or not to go to the ER, you can always call 811. They seem pretty helpful. Only time I went to the ER was when I got hit in the head with a ladder… long story… but recieved excellent care and hardly had to wait.
I think some of the posters are taking this beyond what it is.
zZz, melectric, and halicowtown all probably know when they should go, but forget that there are really silly people all around them. Pregnancy????? BLOODWORK??? A COMMON COLD???
WTF guys… this is obviously not ER stuff.
We should use our heads before heading over there, it is busy normally, if not in the waiting room then inside.
Ask ourselves this:
Should I see where this goes? My fever might get better soon, I might have drank too much or ate too much. I might just have to fart.
I totally agree people abuse the ER system. But what is crazy is that I cut my thumb while cutting some wallboard and the fucker wouldn’t stop bleeding. So not wanting to use the ER (I wasn’t dying or seriously wounded) I went to my family doctor at the time (no longer now) to get a stitch or to and he said he couldn’t do it and sent me to the ER. I felt like a fool/abuser going there to get a couple of stitches but there was fuck all else I could do, the damn thing wouldn’t stop bleeding and I usually clot very quickly.
I had a pretty serious broken bone once (serious as in completely snapped in half… no joke!), was put into Emergency Room B at QEII, sitting on a table because there were no seats, and had to wait four hours before even seeing a doctor. Who was one of the people who got in before me? Some old dude with a little cut on his toe! When it was determined that I needed surgery to put my poor bone back together though, it only took a couple of days before it happened.
There’s really all kinds of stuff I’ve been meaning to see a doctor about for years actually, but keep putting it off. Oh well, my health I guess. If I die from heart failure because these chest pains are more serious than I thought, so be it.
If they’re in there because they’re pregnant, it’s probably not just because they’re pregnant, they’re probably bleeding, Asswipe
Or they’re pregnant and just have gas and need to fart only.
BroTim…
I’ve had one of those…. sliced my hand open just under a knuckle right to the bone (I could see it) … boss told me to wrap it up with duct tape and keep working.
I went to the hospital for 4 stitches and never went back to that job.
Pk you’re lucky – I tried puking and even that didn’t stop the gallbladder pain……I did lose a cpl pounds tho haha
On a weekend I find that the ER is chock full of old guys screaming out for attention on how to take care of the Viagra 4 hour erections……
ewwww old dudes with woodys yuckky poo poo 🙂
Haliwoodgirl; asswipe,
Yes, girls do go because they are, or think they are pregnant, and that it might be atypical.
The IWK however, the womens/children hospital, is completely useless in this case.. right?
OP I agree with your frustration with the lack of understanding of what an emergency means. What I also understand is that not all emergencies are as visually apparent as heavy bleeding or difficulty in breathing. There is a myriad of conditions that can go undetected by the naked eye and are not easily diagnosed in a doctor’s office. Just because someone walks into the ER under their own power and doesn’t LOOK sick does not mean they do not have the potential to be an emergency. They may have been referred to the ER because of a potential life-threatening condition which can only be diagnosed with equipment and timing available at the ER. Some conditions can’t wait the 4-6 months for a CT scan or MRI and last I checked most physicians don’t have ultrasound, MRI or CT scanning capabilities in their office.
In your last sentence you’re suggesting that if my doctor suggests I go to the emerg, I should inform them of their obligation to make sure it’s REALLY an emergency and/or threaten them with a phone call to MSI if their diagnosis and advice ends up being unfounded. Based on what exactly? Your experience as a “not a health care worker” or based on my numerous years of driving past a medical school?
If my physician refers me to the ER then I am damn well going a) because he/she knows a shitload more than I do about medical conditions and b) I’d rather spend 12 hours in an ER waiting room to find out it’s nothing rather than going home finding out it killed me. Ever heard of the phrase “better safe than have your gall bladder explode”?
The ER has triage staff to determine if I am an emergency case or not. And I will wait accordingly for the ER physician. There’s a big sign in the waiting room that states the idea behind triage. I’m sure the staff at the ER would be thankful if they can spend 5 min diagnosing a COLD and send you home rather than scheduling surgery or an oncologist. It may be mostly a thankless job dealing with the emergencies and non-emergencies alike but they chose it, they get paid rather well for it, they also choose the pace at which they see patients and, just like wait-staff at HRM pubs, they can find something else if they don’t like it.
we have a doctor shortage in this country, sometimes a person has no choice but to go to the er and sit all day.