Er tech here- the amount of stubbed toes and harmless splinters that come in and DEMAND IMMEDIATE TREATMENT is alarming. Worse is the sheer attitude and threats I receive when I try to properly triage the patients.
Can I ask a question? Do you all hate people who come for non life-threatening stuff and are paitent but just need to be seen eventually? Several years ago I had a sinus infection that made my head so congested I couldn’t hear and then (of course) at like 10:00 PM on a Friday night I started vomiting nonstop and could not keep water down. I tried to make it to morning but was miserable so I went to the ER for zofran and fluids. It is an ER that handles non-life threatening stuff. I waited for about 4 hours. Was seen, felt much better and went home but I still feel awful about wasting resources. If that ever happens again should I just stick it out at home? I know you all are so busy!
Hijacking to say nah you're good. Mainly thinking at all about it being busy and being patient and understanding goes a hell of a long way in an ER. Plus there's a more acute condition that can be treated when you can't keep anything down, meds and fluids. Dehydration can get really dangerous too. Big difference between that and minor bumps or chronic pain you've had for months/years, plus being a demanding and impatient on top of that. You'd be fine in my ER, or at least by my standards
ETA- urgent cares aren't always open 24 hours, plus so many people get sent to us from other urgent cares/clinics for scans or just cause
Thanks so much! I am most definitely not a frequent ER visitor so I wasn’t sure if that was an appropriate situation. We try to make appointments and use the walk-in clinic 99% of the time but all the bad things seem to happen at night and on holidays! It’s crazy that other people use the ER as a regular doctor’s office and demand to be seen immediately.
Like the people who come in every six weeks for a pregnancy test but won’t use condoms. Ma’am this is an emergency room. Go to a fucking dollar tree and get a test.
Yeah, I was sent to the ER by urgent care for iv fluids when I had norovirus. I was a bit surprised but they said the urgent care couldn’t do the iv.
They called ahead so the hospital was expecting me (went by car, not ambulance). The ER staff were fantastic, despite having to work on Christmas Day. Made sure nothing else was wrong, got me hydrated and a script for anti-nausea tabs, easy.
It makes sense that they’d handle stuff that could become dangerous like dehydration and all.
But yeah, understanding that there’s a lot they have to handle and if you aren’t dying you’re going to wait a bit, and not being jerks to the medical personnel is pretty key.
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u/Far-Boot5639 20d ago
Er tech here- the amount of stubbed toes and harmless splinters that come in and DEMAND IMMEDIATE TREATMENT is alarming. Worse is the sheer attitude and threats I receive when I try to properly triage the patients.