Health care professionals and consumers recently received some bad news regarding the state of care for individuals admitted to the emergency room.
The American College of Emergency Physicians, a national medical specialty organization that represents ER physicians, recently released its report card on the overall quality of care that's being administered in the emergency room. The overall grade was a D-plus.
Dr. Alex Rosenau, president of the ACEP, indicated that the findings are significant enough to warrant more attention being paid to the issue, specifically for lawmakers who passed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
"Congress and President [Barack] Obama must make it a national priority to strengthen the emergency medical care system," said Rosenau. "There were more than 130 million emergency visits in 2010, or 247 visits per minute. People are in need, but conditions in our nation have deteriorated since the 2009 report card due to lack of policymaker action at the state and national levels."
He added that in light of all the changes that have come since the passage of the ACA – including those that have yet to go into effect, like requiring large businesses to make employee benefits available – the state of emergency care has never been a more pressing issue to address.
"This report card is a call to action," said Rosenau.
In multiple categories, emergency care services received a C or lower, including disaster preparedness, public health and injury prevention, medical liability environment as well as quality and patient safety.
The deterioration in ER care may have something to do with hospitals having fewer resources for the amount of patients that are being seen. Numerous media reports have revealed that many ERs are being stretched thin due to an increase in admissions.
