In addition to a press release issued at last month’s Leadership and Advocacy Conference to highlight the RAND Corporation study, ACEP launched a public relations campaign to highlight the value of emergency medicine. The theme is “Saving Millions.” The campaign is built around many of the following key points:

• Four in five people who called their family doctors about a sudden medical issue got the same advice: Go to the emergency department (RAND report)
• Primary care physicians increasingly depend on EDs to see their patients after hours, perform complex diagnostic workups, and facilitate admissions of acutely ill patients (RAND report)
• Emergency physicians provide a disproportionate share of acute health care on weekends, holidays and after regular business hours (CDC)
• Ninety-two percent of patients who visit the emergency department each year have the same condition – a real medical emergency (CDC)
• According to the RAND Report, the 4 percent of America’s doctors who staff hospital emergency departments provide/manage 11 percent of all outpatient care in the United States, 28 percent of all acute care visits, half of the acute care visits by Medicaid and CHIP beneficiaries and two-thirds of all acute care for the uninsured
• Emergency physicians can save money in the health care system because they are key decision-makers in more than half of hospital admissions
• Hospital admissions from the emergency department increased by 17 percent over 7 years (RAND)
• Emergency physicians coordinate transitions of care every day in hospitals across the country, filling the gaping holes in our health care system
• Lack of access to follow-up care is a top concern that influences a physician’s decision to admit patients to the hospital (RAND)

For more information, including the complete report and downloadable radio ads and print materials, go to www.acep.org/savingmillions.