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I will maintain my position that the issue is probably much more complex issue than most people realize and that there is probably some truth on both sides of the equation. Consider the following from the article you posted:

On one hand: "In Los Angeles County, much of the focus of that debate has been on hospital emergency rooms. Ten have closed in the last five years, citing losses from treating the uninsured, and those that remain open are notorious for backlogs."

On the other: Ortega, an associate professor at UCLA's School of Public Health says. "In fact, they seem to be underutilizing the system, given their health needs."

So the actual emergency room people cited the same reason as Decker, while an academic from UCLA says that it's not as bad as some people think. Both situations may be correct. Certainly the people who used to work in the ten locations seem to have "lived it". However Ortega sidesteps that specific issue by drawing statistics from a randomized telephone survey. No matter how one spins the statistics it still boils down to this: The added drain from fewer people than believed could still amount to the tipping point for certain over capacity services. Not only that, but in the absence of records that show the closure claims are fabricated, the reasons for the closures would be based on general accounting principles, and in theory those should be much more detailed and accurate than any random telephone survey. Lastly, if those ten locations didn't close for the reasons stated, why did they really close and where is the evidence?

<blockquote data-quote="Randall" data-source="post: 150351" data-attributes="member: 2682">I will maintain my position that the issue is probably much more complex issue than most people realize and that there is probably some truth on both sides of the equation. Consider the following from the article you posted: &nbsp;On one hand: &quot;In Los Angeles County, much of the focus of that debate has been on hospital emergency rooms. Ten have closed in the last five years, citing losses from treating the uninsured, and those that remain open are notorious for backlogs.&quot;On the other: Ortega, an associate professor at UCLA&#039;s School of Public Health says. &quot;In fact, they seem to be underutilizing the system, given their health needs.&quot;So the actual emergency room people cited the same reason as Decker, while an academic from UCLA says that it&#039;s not as bad as some people think. Both situations may be correct. Certainly the people who used to work in the ten locations seem to have &quot;lived it&quot;. However Ortega sidesteps that specific issue by drawing statistics from a randomized telephone survey. No matter how one spins the statistics it still boils down to this: The added drain from fewer people than believed could still amount to the tipping point for certain over capacity services. Not only that, but in the absence of records that show the closure claims are fabricated, the reasons for the closures would be based on general accounting principles, and in theory those should be much more detailed and accurate than any random telephone survey. Lastly, if those ten locations didn&#039;t close for the reasons stated, why did they really close and where is the evidence?</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Randall, post: 150351, member: 2682"] [FONT=arial]I will maintain my position that the issue is probably much more complex issue than most people realize and that there is probably some truth on both sides of the equation. Consider the following from the article you posted[FONT=arial]: [/FONT][/FONT] [INDENT=1][FONT=arial]On one hand: "In Los Angeles County, much of the focus of that debate has been on hospital emergency rooms. Ten have closed in the last five years, citing losses from treating the uninsured, and those that remain open are notorious for backlogs."[/FONT][/INDENT] [INDENT=1][FONT=arial]On the other: Ortega, an associate professor at UCLA's School of Public Health says. "In fact, they seem to be underutilizing the system, given their health needs."[/FONT][/INDENT] [FONT=arial]So the actual emergency room people cited the same reason as Decker, while an academic from UCLA says that it's not as bad as some people think. Both situations may be correct. Certainly the people who used to work in the ten locations seem to have "lived it". However Ortega sidesteps that specific issue by drawing statistics from a randomized telephone survey. No matter how one spins the statistics it still boils down to this: The added drain from [I]fewer people than believed[/I] could still amount to the tipping point for certain over capacity services. Not only that, but in the absence of records that show the closure claims are fabricated, the reasons for the closures would be based on general accounting principles, and in theory those should be much more detailed and accurate than any random telephone survey. Lastly, if those ten locations didn't close for the reasons stated, why did they really close and where is the evidence?[/FONT] [/QUOTE]

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