Los Angeles Times
April 23, 2003
County-USC Doctors Say Delays Fatal
By Tracy Weber and Charles Ornstein
Emergency room patients regularly wait as long as four days for a bed at Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center, and some die before receiving critical medical treatment, according to sworn declarations by the hospital’s own doctors.
…the case of a 40-year-old woman with an arterial blockage in her lungs who was kept in the emergency room for more than 30 hours because an intensive care unit bed was not available. She suffered cardiac arrest and died.
…another case, doctors couldn’t treat a patient with shortness of breath quickly enough. “This patient died before we were able to help him…”
…an ER in which as many as 156 patients were crowded into 43 treatment areas, exams were conducted in the hallways, and there was “no such thing” as patient privacy.
“Imagine trying to maintain your dignity while using a bedpan in a hallway lined with stretchers.”
“We often have to squeeze three patients, both men and women together, into one booth designed to hold two. The lights are never turned off, the noise level is high, there are no facilities to wash and there is no privacy.”
…noncritical patients are waiting 16 hours or more just to be treated by a doctor in County-USC’s emergency room. If they need a bed upstairs, some are forced to wait a day or longer.
According to the county Emergency Medical Services Agency, County-USC asked ambulances to stay away nearly 75% of the time last year because it had nowhere to place patients. Paramedics who nonetheless deliver patients often must sit and wait for hours to transfer the patient from their gurney to one at the hospital.
Those who need immediate treatment for a fractured pelvic bone can wait up to two weeks for care. And patients who need surgery for such injuries as repeated shoulder dislocations could wait years.
…a 75-year-old woman admitted with a broken hip had to wait a week for surgery because no bed was available. She developed a blood clot from lying prone for so long and died despite the surgery.
…a 30-year-old pregnant woman with gallstones was forced to wait 10 days for surgery. She developed an infection of the gall bladder, which spread to her blood. She lived; her baby died.
In January, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted to authorize the closure of the first 50 beds at County-USC, along with the closure of Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center in Downey. The remaining 50 beds are scheduled to be cut next year.
Comment: We’ve all heard many times the following generic quote. “The United States has the greatest health care system in the world, and we don’t want any part of rationing like they have in Canada and England.”
Well we do have the greatest resources, far more than enough to prevent inhumane rationing of urgent care. But we have the worst system of funding care, which results in health care conditions far worse than those in nations with less health care spending but with greater equity in resource allocation.
If we had a single payer system in the United States the horror story above would never have been written.