When You Go to an ER and There's No One There to Take Care of You

By Maggie Mahar

Recently, I’ve been reading less-well known health care blogs—and finding some provocative stories.

Below, Edwin Leap--who is a physician and a blogger--tells a story about trying to find a specialist for a very sick child in the middle of the night.

Let me preface Dr. Leap’s story by explaining that, in the past, specialists who had “privileges” at a hospital (to treat patients there and to use the hospital's very expensive equipment and operating rooms) were routinely “on call” to treat emergency patients. But these days, more and more entrepreneurial doctors are refusing to fulfill what was once seen as a traditional duty—unless they are paid.

In Money-Driven Medicine, I quote the chief operating officer of a rural community hospital who recalls a conversation with a young doctor who walked into his office and informed him that he would no longer be willing to be on call for the ER. When the doctor had signed on with the hospital, he, like all of the other physicians, had agreed to be available to treat ER patients one week a month. Typically that might mean coming into the ER two or three times during that week. But now, he explained, he wanted to spend more time at home with his children. He was not willing to continue answering the calls unless the hospital would pay him $80,000 a year.

The COO was nonplussed. He knew that an additional $80,000 would work out to $2,200-$3,300 each time the physician came in ( He did not ask how the doctor had calculated that quality time with his children was worth $80,000).

“But we have a contract,” he protested.

The doctor nodded: “Times change,” he said easily.

The COO knew that he had a legal and moral responsibility to cover his ER. He also knew that if he paid
this physician, he would have to pay all of the other physicians.

But he didn’t even try to negotiate. Because he also knew that if he refused to pay the amount asked, he risked alienating not only this doctor, but all of the others who practiced at his hospital. In response, they might well begin referring some of their most profitable business to a hospital in a city just an hour and a half away. He had no choice but to agree.

This is not an uncommon situation; covering ERs has become a problem nationwide. A report by the California Senate Office of Research offers an example of what can happen, citing the case of a man suffering from internal bleeding who came into the ER of an unidentified California hospital. Over the next three hours, six gastrointestinal specialists refused to come to the hospital to treat the patient. Finally, the director of the emergency room lured a specialist to the hospital with the promise of $500 cash. The specialist then performed the needed procedure, and the bleeding was stopped.

Below, Dr. Leap’s post. I will be very interested in your comments.

You won’t help a critically ill child? Is this how low we’ve fallen?
Dr. Edwin Leap, April 4th, 2008

One of my partners recently took care of a child with a retro-pharyngeal abscess.  For the non-medical, this is a serious infection behind the throat that can easily result in loss of an airway.  The child, some 20 months of age, was obviously very ill.

We frequently don’t have an Ear Nose and Throat physician on call at our hospital, and the night that child presented was typical.  So, the only viable option was to transfer the child.  However, when my partner tried to find an ENT surgeon to care for this child in a nearby town, he was met with this response:  ‘I’m not on call for your hospital.’

Now, I understand not wanting to have ridiculous referrals.  I understand not wanting to increase your already busy workload.  I understand that being a surgeon is very time intensive already, so the doc in question probably didn’t need more work.  But the thing is, it wasn’t a drunk with a broken jaw, an elective tonsillectomy, or even a fish-bone stuck in the throat.  It was a child who might have died.

Well, I guess Hippocrates didn’t cover that scenario.  You know, sick child from another town.  After hours, and all that.

Is this how far we’ve fallen?  See, we don’t have endless options for transfer.  We practice in a semi-rural area.  It isn’t Manhattan. There aren’t surgeons on every corner.  Trust me, if we could have handled it, we would.

Is this what doctors have become?  Technicians who feel no sense of urgency or obligation to the sick, in fact, to the most vulnerable of the sick?  Is this how we want our children, or grandchildren, treated?  Dismissively?  With a ‘good luck’ and a hearty pat on the back?  With a ’sorry, but you know how business is these days?’  I hope to heaven not.

That sort of behavior makes me feel angry, and a little sick.  It makes me see how malpractice litigation could get out of hand, or how national health care might slip in the back door.  If we’re so unprofessional that we can ignore a critically ill child on a technicality, then maybe we’ll deserve whatever happens.

Fortunately, the overwhelming majority of docs I know would never behave that way.  Like the intensive care docs who ultimately accepted the child, they do the right thing at the right time, the way we were taught.

We need to call this behavior what it is; childish and unprofessional. And we need to remind ourselves, every day, of why we do our jobs.  And that we have a duty to the sick and injured, convenient or not.

Maggie Mahar is a veteran journalist and author and a frequent contributor for THCB. Her work appears regularly at the Century Foundation's Health Beat blog.  She is currently serving a fellowship at the Century Foundation. Her published works include the highly recommended  "Money-Driven Medicine: The Real Reason Healthcare Costs so Much" and "Bull: A History of the Boom and Bust. 1982 - 2004"