A growing number of children who show up in US emergency rooms can’t get the treatment they need at their local hospital and need to be transferred elsewhere for care, a new study suggests.
Overall, in California, Florida, Massachusetts and New York – four of the most populous US states – pediatric transfers surged 25 percent: from roughly 64,000 in 2006 to close to 80,000 in 2011, researchers report in Pediatrics.
The biggest increase in transfers was for kids with common health problems like abdominal pain and asthma, offering fresh evidence that even basic pediatric care is disappearing from community hospitals, said senior study author Dr Michael McManus of Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School.
‘When kids are taken to their local hospital’s emergency department, they are increasingly likely to be transferred to more distant referral centers for care they used to be able to get at home,’ McManus said by email. ‘We now know that pretty much the same thing is happening across the country.’
