emergency room visits so expensive

Why Are Emergency Room Visits So Expensive?

Emergency rooms primarily exist to treat patients who have serious or even life-threatening injuries or illnesses. Sometimes, however, ERs are also used by people with less severe conditions who want to be diagnosed whatever the time of day or night.

No matter if the condition is minor or complex, emergency room visits are expensive. Emergency rooms are the place to go if the case involves excessive bleeding, the possibility of a heart attack or stroke, obstructed breathing, possible poisoning, fevers greater than 102 degrees, unconsciousness, etc.

Why Are Emergency Room Visits So Expensive?

However, if using the emergency room for minor injuries and illnesses, the patient will incur a large bill, even if they have insurance coverage. ERs operate on a “triage” basis, where the most serious cases are seen first, so the less-serious cases may have a long waiting time before they are treated.

The Costs

Emergency rooms are extremely expensive operations to run due to situational costs and overhead. They require a large amount of equipment that is often expensive to buy and maintain. Also, need to have inventories of supplies from medicines to durable medical goods. They operate on a 24-hour, seven-days-a-week schedule.

It also takes a lot of people to run an emergency room. The clinical staff has to be a specially-trained group of people, able to provide care for the wide variety of cases that could come through their doors. Their support staff must also be able to contribute to the efficient running of the hospital.

All of these human and operational costs, necessary but expensive, are passed on to the patients they serve. The bill for an ER visit is seldom below $1000, even for a minor case, and is often much more. The smart health strategy is to use the emergency room as it was intended- for very serious cases. That same strategy suggests using your primary care physician or urgent care clinic for the situations that aren’t emergencies, but still do need medical care.

Our Urgent Care Walk-In Clinics in Omaha, Bennington, West Omaha, Rockbrook, Crossroads & Bellevue, NE

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