tazzygirl
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Joined: 10/12/2007
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quote:
Many hospitals and all emergency rooms are required by law to treat everyone.
What you're not entitled to
If you're not having an emergency, then the hospital emergency room does not have to treat you. The hospital most likely will direct you to your own doctor or to a less-intensive-care setting, such as a community health clinic.
http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Insurance/KnowYourRights/KnowYourEmergencyRoomRights.aspx
ER's do not have to treat everyone. Only emergency cases. They can, and will, turn away someone who does not fit the criteria.
To get more legal...
At the federal level, we have the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act, popularly known by its acronym, "EMTALA". EMTALA imposes the obligation to provide for examination and treatment for emergency medical conditions and women in labor. The first requirement is that of "medical screening".The law requires that, in the case of a hospital that has an emergency room department, if any individual presents themself to the emergency department and a request is made on the individual's behalf for examination or treatment for a medical condition, the hospital must provide for an appropriate medical screening examination within the capability of the hospital's emergency department, including ancillary services routinely available to the emergency department, to determine whether or not an emergency medical condition exists. The obligation to examine and/or treat does not depend on whether the patient is eligible for Medicare or Medicaid benefits. The term "emergency medical condition" means:
A.1. a medical condition manifesting itself by acute symptoms of sufficient severity (including severe pain) such that the absence of immediate medical attention could reasonably be expected to result in;
2. placing the health of the individual (or, with respect to a pregnant woman, the health of the woman of her unborn child) in serious jeopardy;
3. serious impairment to bodily functions; or,
4. serious dysfunction of any bodily organ or part; or,
(B) with respect to a pregnant woman who is having contractions;
1. that there is inadequate time to effect a safe transfer to another hospital before delivery; or,
2. that transfer may impose a threat to the health or safety of the woman and unborn child.
EMTALA also imposes an obligation to stabilize a patient within the operational and clinical capabilities of the facility, or transfer a patient to another appropriate facility. A hospital may not transfer a patient that presents with an emergency medical condition until the patient is stabilized. Until the patient has been stabilized, no transfer should occur unless the following occurs:
(A)(i) the individual (or a legally responsible person acting on the individual's behalf) after being informed of the hospital's obligations under the law and of the risk of transfer, in writing requests transfer to another medical facility;
(ii) a physician signs a certification that based on the information available at the time of transfer, the medical benefits reasonably expected from the provision of appropriate medical treatment at another medical facility outweigh the increased risks to the individual and, in the case of labor, to the unborn child from effecting the transfer, or,
(iii) if a physician is not physically present in the emergency department at the time the individual is transferred, a qualified medical person (which can in certain cases be a nurse), after a physician in consultation with the qualified medical person, has made the determination and the physician subsequently countersigns the certification that transfer is appropriate.
http://library.findlaw.com/1999/Jun/1/129582.html
This law prevents hospitals from dumping patients. The only thing it requires to everyone who walks through an ER door is to be triaged... assessed... it does not require hospitals to treat everyone.
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