If you ask ER doc Alex Rosenau whether the the emergency response system is close to the breaking point, as outlined in a recent Institute of Medicine report, you'll get an emotional response. Alex Rosenau, D.O., president of the Pennsylvania Chapter, American College of Emergency Physicians and associate vice chair of emergency medicine at Lehigh Valley Hospital, says there's been a jump of a million patients, or almost 25 percent, in Pennsylvania emergency departments alone in the past eight years. At the same time, the state lost 23 emergency departments due to a combination of declining reimbursement, soaring liability costs and uninsured patients. Rosenau paints a grim, Third-World picture of life in a Pennsylvania ER patients stashed in hallways, on-call specialists not available and a system utterly unprepared for a crisis like a flu pandemic. He begs for help from government, and volunteers his chapter of ACEP to do anything necessary to fix the system.
- to hear more from Rosenau, read this opinion piece