Rep. Paul Broun (R - of course) Says All Americans Have Access to Healthcare---The Emergency Room

[ProfessorPlum]

Run time: 02:59 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_QriNyoOYg   Posted on YouTube: April 30, 2009 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: May 05, 2009 By DU Member: ProfessorPlum Views on DU: 584

 

[katmondoo]

1. The cost can be prohibitive

The emergency room is not free, the treatments, the doctors and the tests all cost money. A clinic is a better option.

[bluebellbaby]

2. WE Do? I'm drinking the Kool-Aid again, Aren't I?

I went to a catholic clinic last year for a sinus infection and it cost me over $500... not including the medication...that was another $78...

If I went to the ER it most likely would have cost double that...

And I was at the time a Store Manager with a company that offered "health insurance", if it can be called that...

$260 a month for co-pays that only paid 50%...

I couldn't afford the "insurance"...

[JaneQPublic]

3. Let's list the reasons why this GOP talking point is an idiotic idea

1. That's not what an ER is intended for, and when the public tries to use it a source for general health care, then ER services and ER patients suffer.

2. It's much cheaper to provide someone, say, with high blood pressure with medication and preventive care than it is for that person to show up at an ER with a stroke, then requiring surgery, the care of specialists, and perhaps even admission to a long-care rehab facility and physical therapists.

3. The ER option the GOP supports doesn't explain how people with chronic, terminal, or otherwise ongoing conditions -- like diabetes, congestive heart failure, or breast cancer, for example -- get continuous,specialized treatment from an ER.

Others?

[ProfessorPlum]

5. great list. It's also enormously expensive

Just because you can go there doesn't mean you won't get hit with thousands of dollars of bills. In fact, that's usually what it does mean.

[mmonk]

4. Tell his ass to use it then for general care.

[Akoto]

6. Even if what he said had some shred of truth ...

I rather doubt most people will be willing or able to wait. Where I live, unless you're having a heart attack or are otherwise facing imminent death, you're gonna wait hours to be seen by an ER doc.

[RaleighNCDUer]

7. I've often wondered how many people whose lives were saved by the

emergency room subsequently committed suicide because of the bills incurred.