[christophilus]

I live with private healthcare. The last few trips to the ER have been 8 hour waits, too. This is an under capacity thing. I live in a place that has boomed, and the mismanaged hospital hasn’t remotely kept up. They fired a bunch of folks during COVID, then shocked pikachu found themselves understaffed.

The point is, the entire thing is broken nearly everywhere you look. I don’t know what a better alternative is, but we sure need one.

[softsound]

It's not the same... But what about emergency clinics or walk-in clinics? My brother had a chainsaw accident and they were able to treat him in a few minutes. I kinda hope we get more clinics like this over ER options, I used to go to the ER for a lot of issues until I found these clinics available, now whatever country I'm in America or in Europe I look for them over ER options when available. Good for fevers, fixing injuries, most of the more minor things... I'm not sure about the 8 hour wait but if you already exhausted other options I understand.

[cmh89]

I don't know where OP is from, but long-waits frequently are because of triaging higher severity rates.

If you have a chainsaw accident and its serious, you arent going to wait 8 hours

[chrisweekly]

My visit to the Mass General ER in 2012 involved waiting 25 hours for a ready room.

[sbaiddn]

I live in the US. Every trip to the ER has had <5 min. waits. They're so fast, last time my kid had a fever I went there because the after hours pediatrician was a ten minute drive (10>5).

So you millage may vary.

[softsound]

ER visits really vary. In Austin, Texas you may be able to get in a few minutes to a few hours. Just really depends, when my mom when to the ER last year for extremely high blood pressure she had to wait half a day before she could she see anyone and they thought she might have a stroke. She was fine in the end, but if there was a real emergency I can't imagine what we'd do. I remember we went to the ER at like 4pm but it took until like 2am before she was able to get in and they decided to have her stay the day. I stayed up all night waiting for her to get help it was very stressful. Also what a joy of getting that bill literally a year later, you'd think they would have due dates of when they have to send these out!

[sbaiddn]

"Also what a joy of getting that bill literally a year later, you'd think they would have due dates of when they have to send these out!"

I thought they do, in fact, and the bill expires if not sent out in time.

[brewdad]

You either live in a miracle land where no one ever gets sick yet ER capacity remains high just in case or your child was on the verge of death. The last time I visited an ER with my child it took 10 minutes just to check in. Then a 2 hour wait to be seen.

[sbaiddn]

Miracle land, and it's probably unsustainable. The hospital is large, but opened just over a year ago. My guess is that my neighbors haven't incorporated it into their routines.

Also, where I live there are five (?) Hospitals with ER within a ten minute drive... in suburbia. There just can't be that many people getting deathly ill sick.

[sbaiddn]

I should add this is for my local ER. Although I've never had a long wait in the US (my wife has), my local ER is literally half empty every time I go there, and the triage area 100% empty.