Faster ER in DC?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah for non-emergency emergency room issues, Sibley is great! Got my rabies shot there. Very pleasant.

What kind of animal bite?

Actually we woke up to see a bat flying around our bedroom. A bat bite can be so light that it could bite you without waking you up. Apparently there was a 4 year old girl who was asleep while a bat was in her room. The bat was killed. A month later she died of rabies. They discovered that it was the bat (they must have been able to retrieve the body). So the CDC recommends that people consider getting rabies shots if they wake up to a bat. (Similar recommendation for young children found alone in a room with a bat and for drunks exposed to bats.) I read a little about previous rabies cases. There was one where a guy picked up a bat, felt a pinprick but didn't see a bite or any blood. He died of rabies later. It felt weird to go to the doctor for this but all the medical personnel we talked to knew about this and didn't laugh at us.

Very interesting. I didn't know this. When I was a child we frequently had bats at my grandparents house -- they lived in an old farmhouse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah for non-emergency emergency room issues, Sibley is great! Got my rabies shot there. Very pleasant.

What kind of animal bite?

Actually we woke up to see a bat flying around our bedroom. A bat bite can be so light that it could bite you without waking you up. Apparently there was a 4 year old girl who was asleep while a bat was in her room. The bat was killed. A month later she died of rabies. They discovered that it was the bat (they must have been able to retrieve the body). So the CDC recommends that people consider getting rabies shots if they wake up to a bat. (Similar recommendation for young children found alone in a room with a bat and for drunks exposed to bats.) I read a little about previous rabies cases. There was one where a guy picked up a bat, felt a pinprick but didn't see a bite or any blood. He died of rabies later. It felt weird to go to the doctor for this but all the medical personnel we talked to knew about this and didn't laugh at us.

Great. Now on top of everything else to worry about, I can add worrying that my DC will be exposed to a bat and I won't know it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Georgetown has always been quick wait for us...often times walked right in and to the back.

My severely dehydrated toddler and I waited there for four hours last year.

[Anonymous]

All ERs operate on a triage basis, so wait times really are determined by how sick you are, how sick everyone else is, and how busy the rest of the hospital is (i.e. few available inpatient beds will mean longer wait times for ER patients waiting to be admitted as space is juggled, x-rays for ER patients may take longer if there are a lot of urgent situations happening among inpatients, etc.) In short, you can't always tell just by how busy the ER itself is.

For something that is not life-threatening, I'd avoid the major trauma centers like Georgetown just because there probably will be people sicker than you.

To the pregnant poster with bleeding. I was in the same situation and ended up leaving before being seen. The triage nurse said that if I were miscarrying, there was nothing medicine could do to stop it, so unless I had other symptoms that indicated something else-- or my own health at risk-- I'd be low on the priority list. She was very sympathetic, but there were people who were sicker that could be helped with faster care, understandably.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. My husband went to WHC, waited for 2.5 hours, watched the cockroaches crawl around the waiting room floor, watched people literally writhing in agony get ignored by staff, then he left without ever being seen. He went to Sibley, was seen and treated right away, and was home in less than 2 hours. Which for an ER visit, I think is a near-record.

OP: Doesn't sound like your DH was having an actualy emergency--why not go to an urgent care clinic instead of an ER? Going to ERs for things that can be handled elsewher is one of the main reasons that ER visits take so long in the first place. Just curious.

[Anonymous]

I don't know what people mean when they say "urgent care". I once had a problem that needed to be seen that day, but I didn't feel was ER-worthy. I called three hospitals in this area, and every one of them told me that their "urgent care" was the same thing as their "ER". I was told that to get same-day medical attention, it was the ER or nothing.

Anyway, my husband had a less-severe case of something that is often life-threatening. We had no way of evaluating ourselves (being the wrong kind of doctor) whether his case would require immediate surgery. So that's why we went to the ER.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't know what people mean when they say "urgent care". I once had a problem that needed to be seen that day, but I didn't feel was ER-worthy. I called three hospitals in this area, and every one of them told me that their "urgent care" was the same thing as their "ER". I was told that to get same-day medical attention, it was the ER or nothing.

Anyway, my husband had a less-severe case of something that is often life-threatening. We had no way of evaluating ourselves (being the wrong kind of doctor) whether his case would require immediate surgery. So that's why we went to the ER.

Urgent care is basically a walk-in doctor's office or clinic, no appointment needed, and they have weekend hours, and later hours, not quite 24hr care for most, though. Many have x-rays and basic diagnostic equipment, and can tell you if you need to go to a hospital. They don't require appointments, and are capable of taking care of stitches, things like that. You can often find them in suburban areas, in strip malls, etc. I live in McLean, and we have 2 of them. They do a range of minor services, and don't have anywhere near the wait times of ERs. Try the yellow pages for one in your area, or ask your regular physician if he can recommend the nearest Urgent Care facility for when he can't see you. It'll save you the ER wait in the future. If it's clearly life threatening, you are obviously better off calling 911.

[Anonymous]

Just try googling "Urgent Care" and the name of the city you live in. Here's an example, OP:

http://www.primemedicalcenter.com/

[Anonymous]

I call the ERs at Gtown and Sibley first to get an idea of the wait.

[Anonymous]

If someone has a recommendation for a specific urgent care center in NWDC, I'd appreciate it. When I google "washington DC urgent care" I get a bunch of Dr's offices, plus responses like Farragut Medical, which I know from work has hours like 10-5. That's no help at midnight.

[Anonymous]

Can urgent care facilities put you on a drip for fluids (for dehydration or blood)? Or do you need to go to ER for that? I'm the poster who went to Sibley's ER last Monday morning and needed a drip (but I'm sure I wouldn't have died!). Could that have been done in an urgent care facility?

[Anonymous]

I am really surprised by the recommendations for Sibley. It took them an hour to call me for my intake (paperwork -- not treatment) one night in the ER and I was the only person waiting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
To the pregnant poster with bleeding. I was in the same situation and ended up leaving before being seen. The triage nurse said that if I were miscarrying, there was nothing medicine could do to stop it, so unless I had other symptoms that indicated something else-- or my own health at risk-- I'd be low on the priority list. She was very sympathetic, but there were people who were sicker that could be helped with faster care, understandably.

I'm that pp, and absolutely. Short of a rupturing etopic, at least.

Nonetheless it remains that I was seen immediately at Holy Cross and was very pleased. There were others in the waiting room but nobody obviously desperately ill. I'm sure I would have had to wait had there been more serious patients to triage.