More than 10 people die as they fail to find emergency rooms

A patient is being transported to an emergency room of a university hospital in Seoul on September 25. Reporter Han Soo-bin

The medical crisis sparked by the government's policy of expanding the number of medical school admissions has lasted for 200 days. It is analyzed that the emergency medical system is rapidly collapsing amid a surge in cases of so-called “going around to find emergency rooms,” in which emergency patients are unable to receive timely treatment due to hospitals' inability to accommodate them.

On September 25, the Kyunghyang Shinmun's data journalism team analyzed 34 cases of "going around to find emergency rooms" from February 20, when the doctors’ strike began, to the 24th of this month, and found that it took 1 hour and 32 minutes to arrive at an emergency room after the report and receive treatment. In the meantime, emergency patients were turned away an average of 14.7 times. This means that many patients missed the “golden hour” of treatment as they wandered around emergency rooms. Thirteen patients eventually died, three of whom were under the age of 10. Incidents whose transfer time or the number of rejections were unknown were excluded from the analysis.

Patients traveled over 100 kilometers from Cheongju in South Chungcheong Province to Seoul, Yanggu to Gangneung in Gangwon Province, and Haman to Daegu in South Gyeongsang Province to find an emergency room. Even when they finally made it to an emergency room, in some cases, they died while traveling to a larger hospital where they can get surgery. The illnesses ranged from traumatic injuries, such as fractures, falls, and traffic accidents, to serious illnesses, such as loss of consciousness, stroke, and aortic dissection. By age, eight people were in their 60s, the largest number. Three people were under the age of 10.

The cases of deaths caused by failing to find emergency rooms did not discriminate by age or region. On the 17th, during the Chuseok holiday, a woman in her 30s who showed signs of disturbed consciousness and vomiting was denied medical treatment by 92 hospitals. She finally got to a hospital after 4 hours and 10 minutes, but she died.

A woman in her 20s was found in cardiac arrest on the campus of Chosun University in Gwangju, and was taken to a hospital, but ultimately died on the 12th. At the time, she was found about 100 meters away from the emergency room of the nearby Chosun University Hospital, but paramedics transferred her to another hospital as the hospital's medical staff did not answer the paramedics’ call.

On March 30, a 33-month-old girl who was found in cardiac arrest after falling into a puddle of water in Boeun-gun, South Chungcheong Province, lost her life after not receiving proper medical treatment for three hours. The child, who fell into a 1-meter-deep ditch next to a residential area, was taken to Boeun Hanyang Hospital within 19 minutes, where medical staff revived her pulse with CPR, but she died in about three hours after being rescued after being notified by 11 hospitals that they could not treat pediatric intensive care patients.

According to data on emergency room patient visits submitted by Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker Kim Yoon from the National Center for Health and Welfare, the number of patients visiting emergency rooms decreased by 17 percent from February to July, but the death rate per 1,000 emergency patients was 6.6, up from 5.7 in the same period last year. The rate of all patients per 1,000 people, which provides a partial estimate of those who sought emergency rooms, was 16.5, up 0.9 from 15.6 in the same period last year.

According to the data released by the National Medical Center, the number of patients who visited emergency rooms from February to July decreased by some 17 percent, but the mortality rate per 1,000 emergency patients was 6.6, higher than 5.7 in the same period last year.

The rate of patients, who transferred to other hospitals, per 1,000 people, was 16.5, up 0.9 from 15.6 during the same period last year.

According to the data released by the National Fire Agency, the number of cases of being denied by hospitals more than twice was 84 in 2023, while 121 cases had already reached by August 20 this year. There were 17 cases of three rejections and 23 cases of four rejections, which already exceeded the corresponding number in 2023. The total number of cases being denied by hospitals stands at 3,597, which is already close to 4,227 in 2023. Currently, the government does not separately count deaths caused by failing to find emergency rooms.

※This article has undergone review by a professional translator after being translated by an AI translation tool.