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How to Advocate for Yourself During an Emergency Room Visit
Dr. Cwanza Pinckney, an ER doctor in Houston, offers tips on how to champion yourself in a pandemic
In search for more insight on how to navigate the U.S. health care system during the coronavirus outbreak, ZORA spoke to Cwanza Pinckney, MD, a board-certified emergency medicine physician. Dr. Pinckney is currently treating patients who have the virus while working at several hospitals in the Houston, Texas, metro area.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
ZORA: There are directives on how and when to see a doctor if you are developing symptoms, but they aren’t always clear. When should you go to the emergency room?
Dr. Cwanza Pinckney: The coronavirus follows a typical pathway. It typically starts off with flulike symptoms — fever, chills, body aches. If you are stable overall but not feeling well — meaning you’re not having shortness of breath or chest pains, not severely weak or dehydrated, not vomiting and don’t have diarrhea — I don’t recommend going to the emergency room. Use a screening facility or a telemedicine option. Those medical professionals can recommend next steps. The key indicator in going to the ER is high fever accompanied by shortness of breath. Meaning if you’re a healthy person and now you’re out of breath walking across the room, then you need to go to the ER. And anyone coming into the hospital with preexisting conditions, including hypertension, diabetes, pulmonary problems, and lupus, if you fall into that tier, we are more judicious about your screening at the hospital.
There is a lot of conflicting information about who can get tested and where.
Until we can facilitate more widespread testing, then testing limitations will occur. The most important thing is for patients to understand [that] you have to be your best advocate. So, if one facility can’t provide testing, try another site. Call ahead, and tell the medical providers your symptoms and ask if you can come in to be screened.
As doctors, we want to service as many people as possible, but there are limited supply options. We’re forced to deal with the sickest patients first and trail backwards. It’s not…
