U.S. Emergency Care System Feeling the Strain

The March 12, 2014 Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) reports that the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP) gave the emergency care system an overall grade of D+, with nearly half of the states receiving a grade of D or lower. (Pennsylvania got a C.) Reasons for the low grades include:

• A decrease in primary care physicians, resulting in the emergency department becoming increasingly responsible for care that was once performed by primary care physicians.
• Emergency departments increasingly becoming the entry point for inpatient care as fewer and fewer emergency care physicians will admit patients directly to the hospital.
• A national lack of access to psychiatric care, with these patients ending up in the emergency room.

The report concludes that emergency departments are at the point where they operate in a “near continuous state of crisis.”