South Carolina Receives C, Ranks 26th in the Nation, for Its Support of
Emergency Patients in Report Card on the State of Emergency Medicine
 

State Receives Failing Grades in Access to Emergency Care and
Public Health & Injury Prevention Categories

Columbia, SC — South Carolina received high marks for its medical liability policies and has made important strides in preparing for disasters, but received failing grades for its public health record and for having significant barriers to emergency care, according to a National Report Card on the State of Emergency Medicine, released today by the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP).   The Report Card comes at the time when the national picture looks bleak:  job and insurance losses, a rapidly growing senior population and a recent survey forecasting critical shortages of primary care doctors all point to escalating emergency patient populations.

The five Report Categories (and weightings) are:  Access to Emergency Care (30 percent), Quality & Patient Safety Environment (20 percent), Medical Liability Environment (20 percent), Public Health & Injury Prevention (15 percent) and Disaster Preparedness (15 percent).  In these categories South Carolina ranked 45th (F), 16th (B+), 5th (A), 50th (F), and 34th (C), respectively.

“South Carolina has significant workforce shortages in mental health care, specialty medicine and primary care,” said Dr. Peter Hyman, president of the South Carolina College of Emergency Physicians.  “We must work to reverse these trends, beginning with reversing the declining trends in Medicaid reimbursement rates and increasing the number of physicians in our state who will accept Medicare.  Medicaid patients deserve proper medical care.  We need to fix the system so it works.”

South Carolina received an F in the category Public Health & Injury Prevention, having the fourth highest rate of infant mortality in the nation and an obesity rate of nearly 30 percent.  The state also has a higher-than-average rate of traffic fatalities, with 50 percent of those fatalities linked with alcohol use. The state has lower than average rates of older adults receiving either the influenza or pneumococcal vaccines.

“We need to focus on public education and target resources, starting with our babies and including our grandparents,” said Dr. Hyman.  “We need to act quickly to provide the necessary resources to combat the tragic consequences of these public health problems.”

The Report Card grades are a comprehensive analysis of the support that states provide for emergency patients.  The new Report Card contains more than twice the measures of ACEP’s first Report Card in 2006, as well as a new category for disaster preparedness, which makes it more comprehensive, but not directly comparable, to the previous Report Card. 

 
The South Carolina Report Card made several recommendations for improvement:

• Target public education campaigns aimed at healthier behavior, especially with regard to alcohol use, weight management and safe driving.
• Increase medical access for older adults facing barriers.  Implement vaccination programs that target adults 65 years and older.
• Reduce the high rate of infant mortality.
• Reverse the decline in Medicaid reimbursement rates for office visits and increase the rate of physicians accepting Medicare in South Carolina.
• Attract on-call medical specialists, mental health care providers and primary care physicians to South Carolina by maintaining a good liability environment.  This would include:
  • Lowering the cap on non-economic damages.
  • Abolishing joint and several liability.
  • Instituting mandatory pretrial screening panels.

The nation’s failure to support emergency patients resulted in an overall grade of C- for the nation as a whole.  Massachusetts earned the highest overall grade of a B, and Arkansas ranked last (51st) in the nation with a D-.  The national grade was calculated using the same methodology used for the overall state grades and is a weighted average of the nation’s category grades.

“The weakened economy combined with a failing health care system mean that growing numbers of people will need emergency care,” said Dr. Nick Jouriles, president of ACEP.  “In fact, the role of emergency care has never been more critical to this nation, which is why emergency patients must become a top priority for health care reform.  We are urging President-elect Obama and the new Congress to strengthen emergency departments, because they are a health care safety net for us all.”

The National Report Card on the State of Emergency Medicine was made possible, in part, by funding from the Emergency Medicine Foundation, which gratefully acknowledges the support of The WellPoint Foundation and The Robert Woods Johnson Foundation.

The South Carolina College of Emergency Physicians is a state chapter of ACEP, a national medical society representing emergency medicine with more than 27,000 members.  ACEP is committed to advancing emergency care through continuing education, research and public education.  Headquartered in Dallas, Texas, ACEP has 53 chapters representing each state, as well as Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia.  A Government Services Chapter represents emergency physicians employed by military branches and other government agencies. 

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