Parkland finds 7,000 patients with 6+ ER visits - Beatriz Ruiz 4th Period

     Dallas County has one public hospital, Parkland, serving the county and is constantly overcrowded in its emergency room. Recently, Parkland administration has been trying to alleviate the overcrowding issue by studying how many patients have visited the emergency room more than six times in 2013. Statistics from this study have shown that 7,000 patients have visited the ER 6 or more times this past year, bringing about a total of 50,000 plus visits due to 7,000 patients. These patients tend to be more severely ill suffering from heart disease, diabetes, and/or other chronic conditions. Parkland officials are brainstorming ideas to where these 7,000 patients could better be served in an outpatient facility that is not the ER. The ER had a total of 243,336 visits last year and to know that 50,000 of these are due to the same group of patients highlights a major problem and opportunity to improve service to patients.

     Health care is a major problem in this country and, more close to home, here in Dallas where people that might not have health insurance and might suffer from chronic health issues have no other option than to turn to the ER here at Parkland. Most other hospitals here in the metroplex are private hospitals, and while no ER will turn a life and death situation away, most private hospitals are forced to just stabilize patients in their ER and send them off to the public hospital, Parkland, if the patient has no health insurance. The ER has become a source of primary care for most uninsured patients. Until a successful health insurance program is established that allows true access to see a doctor, the ER will continue to be overcrowded and the long wait times will persist. Something must be done to bring doctors, patients, and insurance together to truly fix the current problem.