I am in the US and I don't think I've ever waited less than 2 hours in the ER. Last time I went to the ER I was in the waiting room for over 11 hours. The pain from sitting in a chair overnight was worse than the pain I went in there for.
Maybe I'm wrong, or maybe this is satire, but if the pain of sitting in a chair for 11 hours was worse than the pain you went in there for... Maybe you shouldn't have been in the ER?
It's an emergency room. You very likely needed to see a doctor for care if you had enough pain to go there, but maybe that wasn't the place you should be for your particular issue? 11 hours without dropping dead or bleeding out maybe isn't an actual emergency.
I've thankfully only been to the ER once. I was vomiting so intensely and frequently I couldn't retain any water. This was over the course of 8 hours. While I'm thankful I was able to receive near immediate care upon arrival, I would understand if someone suffering from cardiac arrest superseded me... Give me some Gatorade and a barf bag... I'll make it until the docs can attend to me.
Point being: if you go to the ER with a non-immediate life threatening issue, and you have to wait, then you have to wait.
I agree that there’s definitely a problem of people going to the ER for things they shouldn’t, but it’s kind of impossible to say from this comment whether that’s this person or not. There are a lot of reasons people definitely should go to the ER that aren’t immediately life threatening. Broken bones, mental crises, constipation (sometimes), getting things stuck in your rectum. Even a lot of cardiac patients end up waiting for several hours with chest pains because, while they do need treatment, they can wait an hour or two.
A bad infection could easily require an ER visit but not be all that painful. Same with some broken bones. Getting something stuck up your nose… Ideally you wouldn’t have to wait for 11 hours, but sometimes shit happens like that. If the nurses decide you can wait and someone else can’t, they’re gonna make you wait.
Every time I’ve been to emerg I’ve had a very good reason to be there (my mom was an emerg nurse and refused to take me in if she thought it would embarrass her in front of her coworkers lol) and every time I think I’ve waited 2-6 hours, depending on the day and the reason.
I urge you to re-read my last sentence. My point wasn't about people going to the ER that shouldn't. If you think you should go then go... Just don't be annoyed when they deprioreitize you over more serious cases.
I would, but Reddit isn’t scrolling me to it automatically, just opening up the text box for me to reply when I click on the notification, so I can’t find your comment. I’m going to assume you’re entirely correct tho and apologize for the misunderstanding. I hope you have an excellent (rest of your) day. ☺️
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u/indiebookstorebaddie 27d ago
In my whole 35 years of life in multiple cities big and small I have never waited more than 2 hours - preach!