Michigan’s ER Wait Times Raise Serious Patient Safety Concerns

A new study is showing that Michigan patients are waiting an average of two hours and 40 minutes in the emergency room before ever being brought back, which one source says is contributing to the state's ranking as the ninth riskiest in the nation for delayed diagnosis.

For anybody who’s been unfortunate enough to have to make a visit to the hospital recently, you’ve most likely seen the tremendously long wait times in order to get in and be seen by a doctor.

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This can happen for many reasons, including an overabundance of people going to the ER or a shortage of staff.

FHV Legal analyzed performance data from Data.CMS.Gov  using four key metrics to determine that Michigan landed at number nine on this list:

Michigan earned a "Delayed Care Score" of 73.92, placing it among the top ten most critical states for diagnostic lag. The state recorded a high death rate of 180.10 among surgical patients with serious treatable complications, suggesting a failure to recognize or diagnose issues in time.

Taking a deeper look into some of the issues, they're seeing very long wait times are leading to people just leaving the ER:

In addition to the 2 hour and 40 minute average wait, 3% of patients leave Michigan emergency rooms without being seen by a provider. Michigan shows a readmission rate of 14.84%, indicating a potential for incomplete initial diagnoses or premature patient discharge.

It says that the average percent of patients who leave without being seen is at 3%, and nearly 15% are readmitted to the hospital. If these numbers are accurate, that's not looking good for patients.