> Patient emergency room visits rose to a record high of 141.4 million in 2014, the same year the Affordable Care Act's insurance expansion went into effect, according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The results contradict policy experts' assertions that unnecessary ER use would decline as more people gained access to health insurance under the ACA.
People get insurance, they use healthcare more. This is not a surprising result.
Thank you. But also - measuring this after first short years of just introducing a new rule is a bit disingenuous, IMHO. How many of these people that went to an ER immediately after they could afford it, actually went there from complications of simple things that could've been relatively easy (aka cheaper) fixed if they would've just gone to a doctor years ago? How many of these who went now and fixed something simple that would be a financial disaster to fix couple years later?
PS. Sorry, I hope I did not mess up previous sentences too much to make it completely opposite of what I am trying to say.
The results contradict policy experts' assertions that unnecessary ER use would decline as more people gained access to health insurance under the ACA.
People get insurance, they use healthcare more. This is not a surprising result.
https://www.modernhealthcare.com/article/20170913/NEWS/17091...