BAUCUS COMMENTS ON GAO REPORT: EMERGENCY ROOM CROWDING WORSENS

[slipslidingaway]

PATIENT CARE SUFFERS

http://finance.senate.gov/press/Gpress/2009/prg060109a.pdf

"Finance leader says overcrowded emergency rooms illustrate system‐wide crisis,
reiterates need for comprehensive health care reform
Washington, DC – Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D‐Mont.) commented
today after the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released new findings that
overcrowding in hospital emergency rooms continues, resulting in longer, sometimes dangerous
wait times for patients and forcing ambulances to divert patients to other facilities...

...GAO found that patients in need of immediate care (1 to 14 minutes) waited an average of 28
minutes and exceeded the recommended wait almost 75 percent of the time. The report cited a
lack of inpatient beds as the largest contributor to overcrowded emergency rooms, caused in
part by competition for beds with more profitable, elective‐surgery patients. Inadequate access
to primary care also contributed. Chairman Baucus has proposed ideas to address both factors
by increasing primary care access and reorienting incentives to encourage quality care..."

[Stellabella]

1. Not surprising at all.

I had to laugh at the news today. They think they're doing a good thing by providing free mammograms to women who don't have health insurance or can't afford a mammogram.

What the hell good is that going to do if the woman can't afford to then have the surgery she may need? Or are hospitals performing cancer surgeries free now?

[slipslidingaway]

5. True, but maybe some might have family who could help...

otherwise not being able to afford follow up care would be heartbreaking.

[Triana]

2. WHY is BAUCUS involved in this? What does HE know about health care?

Not a damn thing. All HE knows is how much money he will continue to get from insurance companies, HMOs and 'health care' organizations - private, for PROFIT industries.

F*CK Baucus!

[slipslidingaway]

6. Well they have to finance this reform bill, but he is using this report

to help push through the bill...whatever that may be.

[Triana]

9. Financing it is one thing. Designing it is another...

..someone else should be designing it.

[lovuian]

3. let me explain this it makes no difference if you have

insurance or not
in the ER its triage
the sickest get seen first

and there are many many sick people out there

[slipslidingaway]

7. Yes, but according to this report there are too many people

who need to be seen.

:shrug:

[stevedeshazer]

4. MAX bullshit.

Baucus is trying to jam through phony universal health care.

Single payer? No. Just watered-down crap to enrich the insurance industry.

[slipslidingaway]

8. Insurance companies need to keep their profits, also I wonder

about the access to primary care doctors since many in Med school are taking a different path.