It’s called triage. If you go in with a splinter you’re going to have to wait behind the guy that came in after you with a piece of rebar through his skull.
Lots of people don’t understand that it isnt a deli counter where you take a number and are called in order.
Many of these conservative “studies” compare wait times between Canadian booboos and American traumas without explicitly calling it out, and that’s not a fair comparison.
Lots of people don’t understand that it isnt a deli counter where you take a number and are called in order.
Conservatives tend to be stupid and ignorant, yes.
I remember when they sent me to an hospital from the clinic because it was possible I had something really concerning. I passed in front of everyone. It took 1 minute the second I talked to the reception. When they figured out it wasn’t lethal, it took some time… you know… to take care of the dying people.
In the US, if the wait time is ever quicker it’s because a lot of people who SHOULD be there just died at home or at least tried to tough it out and will live with those consequences for the rest of their lives.
And yea, conservatives(lowercase, to not exuse anyone not in the Conservative party) are constantly fucking over our public instiutions. That includes healthcare, and frankly those politicians doing the damage are just murderers for hire. We have to do better, but at least we aren’t the US.
if you are waiting 12 hours in the ER then you are probably there for a runny nose or something equally silly.
Triage is a thing that exists, and ensures that people get attention in the order they need it. . and when an ER is full of a mass causality event, your skinned knee or runny nose is not a priority.
I went to the ER in the US for an infected gallbladder full of stones, it was so bad I had to be hospitalized for almost a week. I was in the ER waiting room in the fetal position for literally hours after a nurse took my vitals before a doctor saw me, there were a couple other people in the waiting room. I nearly died. Over $20k bill after insurance.
I’ve also gone to the same ER with relatively mild UTI, I peed blood and fainted from the sight but otherwise didn’t really need the ER. They saw me immediately, and it was very busy.
Triage is a thing, whether they do it properly is another thing.
Also, you don’t know what happened an hour before you showed up. Triage doesn’t mean a serious case doesn’t have to wait or a minor one does.
you are probably there for a runny nose or something equally silly.
It’s silly to go to the ER for a runny nose if you have better options, like a family doctor with whom you can get appointments within a few days. Sadly, a lot of Americans don’t have health care coverage and have to go to the ER for “silly” things because they don’t have other options.
Very much this.
I’ve had seven heart attacks.
When I go in with heart attack symptoms, which I’ve had to do a handful of times (that it turned out not to be a heart attack, I mean) - I don’t like going in there and them getting me back quickly. It means things are potentially bad. heh.
I understand that nobody likes waiting, and i’ve waited before and it sucks. But it sucks less than needing to be taken back quickly, really.
Seven heart attacks? Youch.
Anyhow, IMO, the worst experience in the ER is when you have a bone or muscle injury. You’re triaged pretty low because it’s not getting worse so there’s no urgency to treat you quickly. OTOH you’re in a lot of discomfort, you often can’t find a way to sit so you’re not in pain. And yet, you really do have to stay in the ER. It’s not like if you have a bad cold or flu or something that will probably get better on its own, or where you might be able to leave and come back the next day if it’s really busy.
Been there, done that. Sitting for six hours in the ER with a shattered ankle was probably the worst pain I ever had to deal with.
I understand that it wouldn’t have changed anything if they treated me sooner, but for gods sake, at least give me an ice pack next time. Not cooling a fracture is probably the worst thing you can do apart from not correcting in.
Yeah, my experiences weren’t that bad. But, I remember recently sitting there for hours awkwardly trying to support my shoulder with my other arm so whatever was broken didn’t have to bear the weight of everything else. Of course, one of the first things they did after assessing me was to give me a sling… that would have helped hours earlier.
I dunno, maybe they need a “first pass treatment” triage where they hand out slings, ice packs, compression bandages, etc. The sort of things that a nurse can “prescribe” that might make things feel better, can’t really make it worse, and will tide you over until the doctor can take a better look.
Exactly my brother came in with a cut bleeding all over the ER, he needed like 12 stitches. They took him right away. All he remember from that day(he was pretty out of it) was some woman complaining that she been waiting for hour why his getting to go first.
While his blood spilling out on floor she had the gull to say that.
Same with chest pain. If you go to the ER complaining of chest pain most times they take you straight back. Happen to me was sick told my boss chest was hurting he suggested hospital cause you know heart attack. Er by house so went they wisk me straight back.
Funny not funny story about that visit. One thankfully no heart attack. But they did find a mass on my lungs ( lucky turn out to be acid reflux due to a cough I had) anyway when he sees this he says. "Might be cancer but I don’t know. " scare the shit out of me. I just replied "well if you don’t know don’t say that. "
They scheduled me a specialist but it was a 2 month wait, by time they saw me the mass was gone. That doctor figured it was the acid reflux got in there. Good news is got on meds for that and no more acid reflux for me.
I can never understand how people can be that entitled. When I’m in the ER I’m always annoyed when someone comes in who clearly needs to be seen faster, but I couldn’t imagine complaining about it or even pretending that I’m being treated unfairly.
Also that sounds scary as shit
Me neither, and when told the story got angry. But just shows that a lot people have main character syndrome even long before I heard the term.
Went for heart problems. Waited 12 hours in an empty waiting room.
Canadian here its not silly, you can wait 12+ hours for very serious conditions (as I have once, I realize this is anecdotal).
This doesn’t mean its worse than in the states. I understand on average we are doing better healthcare wise than the states (interms of cost and mortality). However for the well insured in the states I believe the care is better.
Yet another issue with being so close to the states our health care suffers because our corrupt politicians see your system and drag us closer to it. You all also attract doctors away from us.
I think wait times were better. And now they’re terrible, but what you say plays a big role. And as such, we’ve seen urgent care businesses (hate saying that) explode. There’s one every mile where I live, including pediatric urgent care. And I’m not complaining. I’ll complain maybe about costs, but the idea of this stepped-down, non-emergent care, is a great way to deal with the problem.
Now, make it free* (except I pay taxes already so just use those).
People go to ER or get a prescription here sometimes. Then complain about the wait 😭😭😭
I wish I could agree with you, but one time I sat in an emergency room for 12 hours bleeding from my throat into a bowl that was overfilling with my own blood before I got properly triaged and scheduled for emergency surgery.
Definitely not Canadian
Canadian. Recently injured, reasonably severely.
Ambulance on scene, admitted immediately, consult, imaging, initial treatment and out in 3 hours. Multiple regular follow ups and imaging - none of which took more than an hour.
If you’re sick or injured you get seen pretty quickly.
As someone else put it - the system is really good at solving acute problems and saving your life.
Keeping you healthy - that’s more up to you (than it should be). It’s not close to perfect but I’d pick it any day over whatever it is in Lake Americaland.
For real, that’s what triage is for. A lot of people go to the hospital for something they think is serious but is actually minor. My ex started getting panic attacks at one point, and after taking him to the ER for like the third time and waiting like 2 hours he calmed down and we went home instead. People who are actually bleeding out or whatever will be seen first.
yeah you basically never wanna do psych stuff in an ER unless the behavior is unsafe enough that they’re likely to end up there anyway. The only psych interventions ED staff know how to do is emergently drugging a person unconscious which is rarely necessary. You more likely want some kind of specific psychiatric crisis services but you still need to be able to communicate effectively enough to let them work out a basic safety plan because if you go in with “I wanna die nothing will ever get better and you can’t talk me out of that” they’re gonna get you sent to an ER, which as stated, is less than ideal.
What in the commie sense is this?
what, you think it should be first come first served?
Just a poorly landed joke/pun on common sense
oh, lol
Correct. Moreover many provinces have seen flagrant de-funding and de-prioritization of health care as right wing grifters attempt to purposefully erode public healthcare in a bid to prop up private care. This has led to availability shortages which in turn cause more people to seek ER assistance than they otherwise would, and hence the long wait times.
My hope is we collectively pull our heads out of our asses and see how fucked things are in the US and reverse course.
our system here in Lake Statesiaville River is to send you down shit creek. some of us are lucky enough to get the family turding stick or a paddle.
Ah yes, this classic lie.
I fondly remember back in the olden days of news-papers reading an article that very fairly and balancedly compared ER wait times in the US to specialist referral times in Canada to show how badly socialized medicine was failing. More than zero people read that article and thought “USA! USA!” then went on to vote and share their ideas with people.
Then there was a big splash with a “”“study”“” that actually compared ER times to ER times and the US freaking dominated!!! Of course, if you read past the headline you’d find cherry picked cases of “bleeding to death” in the USA versus “sniffles” in Canada.
Point being, there are many ways to lie and these bastards will try all of them.
Lies, damned lies, and statistics.
You can use statics to prove anything. 39% of people know that
Hate to have to repeat this.
My late dad had a fell at home and broke his femur in two places.
Half an hour after his home fall alert was triggered, a team of paramedics was at his home. They got there before I arrived and had already stabilised and immobilised him.
An hour later he was admitted in ER, got checked and X-rayed.
Four hours later he was in the OR room, where they replaced half his femur with a piece of titanium. Then he was at the hospital for one week and then sent to a recovery clinic.
He paid zero € for all the process, including ambulance, intervention, ‘hardware’ and recovery.
Oh, this is Spain, not precisely the richest country in the EU.
Of course, if you go to ER because you’re sneezing, you will have to wait. But if you go to a private clinic using your private insurance you have to wait too…
It’s called triage. We do the exact same thing in the usa. And that’s the case whether you have insurance or not. They don’t even know if you have insurance at this step of it, to be honest.
Oh yea, but in the states is going to cost you a car or 5.
They do know if you have insurance in most cases but it’s against federal law to discriminate based on insurance coverage based on EMTALA and the civil penalty is over $100,000.
necessito aprender espanyol. i gotta move there if the medicine works on that fee structure
You can tell these people have never visited an ER in the US when they post shit you could tell was a lie just by accidentally glancing into any hospital window.
They don’t care. They just believe they have enough money to get priority in a for-profit system, at the expense of those who have less money but actually need urgent care.
“Pedo Daddy told me to hate Canada so now I hate Canada.”
If Canadians waits in an ER, that means that what they had wasn’t life threatening and people with worse conditions took the priority over them.
If an American waits in an ER, it could be that their insurance company is delaying everything and hopes that they die so they don’t have to pay for treatment.
They are educated in triage, which is the only sensible way to handle emergency responses. A man with a sore throat should never take priority over a kid with a broken arm.
People think they are paying for medical attention, but what they are really paying for is their minor problems being taken more seriously than major problems that poorer people have.
Private for-profit healthcare, even in conjunction with public healthcare, is a blight upon humanity contradicting everything modern medicine stands for.
This was once the case in the US prior to EMTALA laws being introduced in 1986. Which is pretty dystopian, even if it’s not the case today.
It wasn’t so much the insurance company though. It was private hospitals dumping uninsured patients into public ones without stabilizing care even if they were actively dying because they didn’t want to absorb the cost. Essentially pure evil / end stage capitalism.
Italy, socialized healthcare:
Last year I got involved in a crazy car accident that left me with serious injuries.
1 hour after the accident I already had the first MRI done, a specialist surgeon saw me, determined that my injuries needed a second MRI and a CT scan but that they were not life threatening. A couple of hours later I had all the required tests done and assigned a bed in a room to start recovering. 3 days later I had back surgery and some more days in the hospital to rest. My injuries were not life threatening but the OR was ready for me from the moment they called the hospital saying they were bringing a multi-trauma patient.
In a few months from now, I’ll have to go back to remove the bars they put in my back to keep the vertebrae in place.
The total cost of the whole ordeal was exactly 0€ (unless we want to count the book I asked for to read something during my stay).
Fuck the US healthcare vigorously with a spiked stick. If this happened there, I’d be better dead because the debt I’d have now would be insane.
I think, by this point, most Americans who are willing to listen to reason know that emergency medicine is 1000000x better in basically every other developed country, and even in many less developed countries. It can be a country where the entire medical system is publicly funded, like the UK. Or it can be one where it’s all privately funded but insurance is mandatory and the lowest-cost plans are controlled and subsidized by the government like in Switzerland.
But, what’s hard to convey is how much freedom and peace of mind this all gives you. So many Americans are locked into a specific job because it has good health insurance, or because if they switched jobs they’d have to find new health insurance while having a pre-existing health condition. Being unemployed is terrifying because your health insurance is tied to your job. And, even if you have insurance, there’s the fear that they won’t honour a claim or will weasel out of a payment.
Even if someone has good insurance and isn’t afraid of losing it, there’s all the bureaucracy. There’s in-network doctors and out-of-network doctors. There’s co-pays. There’s trying to decide which spouse goes on the other’s health plan. There’s filing forms. There’s even sometimes stuff like wondering if the doctor is prescribing something because it helps with their bottom line, or if they genuinely think that you need it.
Then there’s the billing. If you have good insurance you might never actually have to pay anything other than a nominal co-pay, but you often can’t escape the billing paperwork. At best that’s just time consuming and annoying. At worst it’s a constant source of terror and stress. This is especially true with serious health issues that are expensive to treat, and where your time, energy and effort should really be about getting well.
I’m in Canada but I’ve lived in the US, and I hated every second of their health care system, despite having effectively a Rolls Royce insurance plan. In Canada can be fired, quit my job, retire, join a start-up, or do anything I want and my health insurance is completely unaffected. If I had a spouse, they’d be on the same plan, there’s not second spent thinking about strategizing about that, or about anything else. There are no co-pays. There are no forms to fill out. I never worry about a doctor upselling me on something I don’t need. Behind the scenes doctors still bill for their work, someone pays for the medicine, the hand sanitizer, the bedding, the wheelchairs, and everything you might see in a hospital, but the patient (and their family) never sees any money change hands, it’s just so much more simple that way.
Oh, and I just forgot another example of where the US system fails in ways that Americans probably wouldn’t notice: airborne illnesses. In most countries, people get flu shots. If they feel sick they have sick leave, and if they want to see a doctor they can. If you’re on public transit in Switzerland you don’t often see someone coughing or sneezing because if they’re not feeling well they’re not out in public. In Japan they take that even further and people put on masks when they feel like they might be coming down with something so that they don’t spread it. In the US, a lot of people don’t have healthcare coverage. They can’t see a doctor if they’re feeling ill. They expect to be charged for vaccinations and maybe flu shots. So, if you’re on public transit in the states, you’re more likely to be sharing a cabin with people who are coughing or sneezing or sniffling because they can’t get it looked at, and they can’t afford to miss work (and there are no guaranteed sick days).
This made the pandemic so much worse in the US. Even before you throw in the anti-vaxx misinformation and “the gubmint can’t control my body” idiocy, you still have people who probably have COVID out in public spreading it around because they can’t miss work, and don’t believe they can get tested or treated for free.
Anyhow, I hope that the more obvious benefits of socialized medicine, like being treated for free no matter what are becoming more clear to Americans. But, really, they should understand that that’s just the big, obvious thing. The massive social and mental health drag their system puts on their entire society is something that’s hard to appreciate if you haven’t lived in both systems and felt how different they are.
Godamn I envy this
Dead* not death,
Death is like the subject of dead/dying, whereas dead is a state that things can be if that makes sense, as I type this I’m realizing I’m still a little drunk, excuse me
My bad, was probably a typo when typing while talking IRL 😅
No worries homie thought it could have been a second language thing
As an US American living in Germany: socialized healthcare or death. Fuck the US system. It’s designed to torture you to add money to a billionaire’s pocket.
If you’re waiting 12 hours in the triage area of the emergency department, then you probably should have either gone to your primary doc, or an urgent clinic.
12 hours means either the waiting area is unusually full of extremely unstable patients, or you are especially stable yourself.
I get that not everyone has access to different levels of care, but urgent clinics exist to take the load off the emergency departments.
Here the urgent clinics charge you $500 to tell you to go to the ER.
i dunno. last time i was waiting 12 hours in the triage area, my surgeon burst through the doors yelling at people for making me wait because he had a bed for me eleven hours ago. sometimes there’s a paperwork fuckup.
Unfortunately, you also have to advocate for yourself as a patient. Ideally you have someone trusted along that can help with that, but if you’ve been sitting there for hours, you need to find out exactly what’s going on. Especially if it is serious.
In America, I pay for health insurance that I can’t use because I can’t find a fucking doctor! Seriously, I’ve been trying to get a PCP for years but everyone I call is not taking patients. I’m on several different waiting lists.
The first thing I noticed when I was over in europe 30 years ago, is the hospital waiting rooms are small compared to American standards in larger cities.
The reason: routine non-emergency care is handled at the clinics because those are free/inexpensive too. So emergency rooms tend to have less traffic as people don’t wait as long for care. Earlier intervention = better health outcomes.
The regular clinics had very short wait times. You could get a routine appointment within a few days. The clinic was busy but you weren’t waiting for 2-3 hours for a regular appointment. (Maybe 15 minutes).
That’s all very, very dependent on what kind of appointment you’re trying to get.
Want to see my GP/family doctor? 1-2 days, same day if it’s an emergency.
ENT? Month or two at most usually, unless it’s a super busy time for them. May need to go to one in another city of course.
Want to see a dermatologist? About a year, 2 at most.
Want to see a psychiatrist within the national healthcare system? No.
