To be fair I had exactly that same experience at the UCSF Emergency Room in 2017. Four hours in the waiting room, and then the only bed they could give me was against one wall of a busy hallway.
Yes its very common even in richest places. Case point #2 - Geneva, Switzerland has the biggest public hospital in whole country (HUG). They employ around 10k personnel overall, and Geneva is relatively small city (they call it the smallest metropole for a reason). There is no shortage of money or high tech equipment.
But if you came pre-covid during say weekend night and you were not clearly about to die, 10+h waiting time in emergency was not unheard of (wife was serving there for some time as doctor, those folks deserve some proper respect). Simply overwhelmed, not enough staff comprised mostly by junior doctors. Now they are properly good in diagnosing whether your excruciating pain is life-threatening or not, but it must suck big time to be on patient's side.
This is by far the biggest emergency in whole canton. Any private clinic or smaller medical centre will send serious cases straight there.
Its not something discussed frequently but that's just how things are, in one of the richest and well-organized countries in whole world. Don't expect much better experience if you have bad luck with timing.
this describes many ER visits I've had, ones with my kids and ones I had myself.
ERs are the worst possible places to go for medical care, except for near-immediate death. Over time, especially in the US, more and more people use the ER as first-line care (especially on the weekend).
Last week, my son had COVID (tested positive) but mild symptoms. At some point he says "I have a blue tongue, I don't remember having that before". Doctor and wife want to rush him to the ER and I say no. My daughter and I debugged it a day later (he had just taken a blue gummy pill, and somehow didn't think to mention that). What would have happened if we went to the ER? Shrugs from the doctor after sitting around the ER at midnight-5AM ("yeah I guess it's not cyanosis and it's gone now"), my wife and I have increased exposure to COVID in the ER, and a $3K bill for looking at a tongue.
But if you came pre-covid during say weekend night and you were not clearly about to die, 10+h waiting time in emergency was not unheard of (wife was serving there for some time as doctor, those folks deserve some proper respect). Simply overwhelmed, not enough staff comprised mostly by junior doctors. Now they are properly good in diagnosing whether your excruciating pain is life-threatening or not, but it must suck big time to be on patient's side.
This is by far the biggest emergency in whole canton. Any private clinic or smaller medical centre will send serious cases straight there.
Its not something discussed frequently but that's just how things are, in one of the richest and well-organized countries in whole world. Don't expect much better experience if you have bad luck with timing.