Idaho emergency rooms receive poor ratings

In a study by the American College of Emergency Physicians, Idaho ranked 41 out of 50 when it comes to emergency room experiences.

Several Eastern Idaho hospitals said they pride themselves on speedy and quality care. Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center even has a whole billboard dedicated to proving average wait times throughout everyday.

In a statement from the hospital, they say they consistently support efforts to increase access to emergency care in Idaho, and to recruit primary care physicians and specialists to our state. Hospital officials say they want all patients treated compassionately and quickly while ensuring quality is high.

ACEP researchers claim it takes more time than needed for ER patients to receive treatment, taking an average of four hours. but when investigating we found this to be false when it comes to Eastern Idaho facilities.

In the upper valley, Madison County came in at only two hours from arrival time to discharge or admittance. EIRMC had similar wait times with only 2 hours and 36 minutes. In the lower valley, Bingham Memorial reported an average time 2 hours and 32 minutes. Portneuf medical center came in at an even two hours.

Portneuf Medical Center’s spokeswoman Brenda Stanley said. the low ranking couldn’t be further from the truth when it comes to the region.

“We get those people into triage within five minutes, into a room within seven minutes and then seeing a doctor in about an average of 11 minutes, which is incredible. Some of our patient satisfaction scores for our ER are some of the highest in the nation for hospitals that have been surveyed,” she said.

The ACEP also stated in their study that quality of care was not taken into consideration. Instead, it was based on access to emergency care, quality, patient safety, medical liability environment, public health and injury prevention and disaster preparedness.

America as a whole was also graded, receiving a D- overall.