Wednesday, May 24, 2017

The wait at Elmhurst Hospital is a killer


From the Daily News:

The wait time for the emergency room at Elmhurst Hospital Center is in critical condition.

The average emergency room patient at the Queens facility waited 114 minutes to be seen by a doctor in 2016, according to records obtained by the Daily News.

The nearly two-hour delay was the lengthiest recorded at any of the city’s 11 public hospitals in at least the last five years — and close to four times as long as the national average of 30 minutes, according to data for 2014 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

For some of the patients, the wait is actually longer than two hours.

Hospital staff attributed the lengthy delays to a lack of nurses.

At times, one nurse is responsible for up to 12 patients, said Pattie-Dean Thompson, an ER nurse.

“That leaves us running from patient to patient,” she said.

Another issue is the large number of patients with minor ailments flooding the emergency room.

The long wait time comes as the number of emergency room patients at the public hospital has decreased, records show.

18 comments:

(sarc) said...

But wait, Obamacare fixed the healthcare industry and assured that all would have healthcare.

With everyone covered, you do not need to use the emergency room for minor issues.

Oh, By The Way, if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor...

Anonymous said...

The ER waiting time has been horrendous for the past 20 years or more. Obama Care was supposed to fix that. That's what Anthony Weiner told us before the Affordable Care Act was passed. Could he have been lying?

Anonymous said...

Not entirely the fault of hospital or staff shortage. Many people now use the emergency room for all illnesses. I've seen people bring their children in to be treated for a cold

Unknown said...

This is a bad hospital and they ripoff Medicare patients. My wife was here and they double billed. One night in the er for doing nothing cost $4000. Elmhurst hospital is the worst nightmare imagineable and the doctors are incompetent.

Gary W said...

Ctrl F "Illegal Aliens" No Matches Found

Ctrl F "Undocumented Immigrants" No Matches Found

Ctrl F "Overpopulation" No Matches Found

Fake news article is fake.

Anonymous said...

'For some of the patients, the wait is actually longer than two hours.'

Are there no more editors at the Daily Snooze?

Half the people will be OVER the 2 hours, that is the DEFINITION of average.

Idiots.

Anonymous said...

Run by the government?

The sad truth is that will be the doctored number and it still is so pathetic.

The real time will be much worse.

I wonder why they are worse than Kings County, Coney Island, Lincoln, Harlem, and Metropolitan.

It can't be by much.

Anonymous said...

Radical concept: How about we give the preference for immigration to educated people with skills in nursing instead of the unskilled, uneducated from South of the border? Future gang members and lifelong welfare recipients.

Wouldn't that be a step in the right direction?

Anonymous said...

Screw the national average as a baseline comparison. Of course an inner city hospital ED will have a longer waiting time than Middle of Nowhere Iowa where there are more cows than people.

How about a subgroup of urban centers with populations over 5 million?

It wouldn't look so bad then.

Anonymous said...

Pattie-Dean, Pattie-Dean.

Soon to be unemployed!

Pulled back the curtain to show the mess.

Anonymous said...

If I ever have to go there I am going to check in and then go across the street to La Fusta to eat. When I am done I will be closer to being called!

La Fusta always smells great as you pass it.

Anonymous said...

Lost my brother in 75 to a screw up in the ER. He was 18 in a car accident bleed to death from a trach. while in ICU. Would not send my worst enemy there.

Anonymous said...

They will all be like this when we have single payer healthcare!

Tony Notaro said...

Third world people=third world hospital

Anonymous said...

2 hours is nothing, its like 8 - 12 hours at Wycoff Heights (unless your pregnant and illegal) People laying on the floor moaning like a war scene triage you would never think this could be possible in America but yes.

Anonymous said...

Blame the illegals. They dont have health insurance except for the ones who are lucky enough to get obamacare and medicaid. They go to the hospital for EVERYTHING since they can get away without having to show id and then they can make up a phony address and name. I worked in coney Island hospital for a while and there was a man in my office who used to get back so many unopened bills with "return to sender, nobody by that name lives here". There were PILES of them EVERYDAY just sitting on his desk! Plus if an illegal goes into the hospital and actually wants to work out a deal to pay their bill, the hospital was able to "fee scale" them for as little as 10/visit and all they had to do was show some handwritten note from their employer stating their income.....which we all know was probably a false document. If you were a citizen, however, you had to show your paystubs or a letter of disability or social security in order to get "fee scaled " but since you are a citizen, you get fee scaled based on your income and the LEAST a citizen had to pay was 15 bucks /visit but if you made a bit more it was 30, 45,60 etc/visit. So yep you can thank the wonderful illegals for our long waits and mayor dumb dumb for welcoming them here!

Anonymous said...

"I wonder why they are worse than Kings County, Coney Island, Lincoln, Harlem, and Metropolitan."... Elmhurst Hospital is surrounded by illegal immigrant neighborhoods and for an additional bonus gets all the prisoners from Rikers when they feign an illness to get some time off the island. BTW a 2 hour wait at Elmhurst would be a record breaking short visit.

Anonymous said...

Have an ICE bus and a platoon of ICE officers at the front door and patrolling the ER. Take them all away. Just make sure there are plenty of Russian, Hindu, Bengali, Arab, Spanish and Chinese interpreters. Hire only American citizens at the hospital, not illegal immigrants who aid and abet their country men. Oh, I just woke up from my wonderful dream. Back into the third world nightmare. And while you are are at it, hire some white people to work for MTA.

So sad, I'm crying over all the sponsors pulling out of the Puerto Rican day parade. They can bankroll the St. Patrick's Day parade instead. Hmmm, what do they need all those corporate sponsors for anyway?