Emergency room waiting times are exploding: "It's a downfall," warns a doctor

"It's extremely worrying." Emergency physician Aurel Guedj expressed his concern on Friday on RMC after the publication of median waiting times for patients in emergency rooms by the Department of Research, Studies, Evaluation and Statistics (DREES).

The DREES survey was conducted in 2023 among all emergency departments in France. "The longest wait times are in the overseas departments, where the median emergency room stays are 4 hours, compared to 3 hours at the national level," observes the survey's project manager, Elvire Demoly. Normandy is one of the least affected departments, with a median wait time of 2 hours 50 minutes.

These significant disparities between different departments can be explained in several ways. "These lengths of stay will depend on the proportion of elderly people who present themselves at emergency services," explains Elvire Demoly. The healthcare offerings may also explain the differences.

"There are people who come to the emergency room because they haven't been able to find a medical appointment. This reason is given by 16% of patients in overseas territories, 25% in Île-de-France and Corsica," explains the DREES project manager.

Emergency physician Aurel Guedj also mentioned, on Apolline Matin , "an operational part" which differs depending on the region, in other words "you don't have the same protocols depending on the region".

The DREES survey reveals that the median time spent by patients in emergency rooms has increased by 45 minutes in ten years. "From a national perspective, we are currently in a kind of decline," warns Aurel Guedj.

"Waiting times for a hospital bed are in the order of more than 24 hours," adds the emergency physician. He particularly mentions the risk of excess mortality for patients over 75 years old when they visit the emergency room:

"You have a 40% excess mortality rate for a 75-year-old patient who spends the night in the emergency room."

Aurel Guedj is concerned about the situation in emergency rooms, which he describes as "the thermometer of our health system." "When emergency rooms aren't doing well, it's generally either because the upstream side isn't doing well, meaning there aren't enough medical services available in the cities, or because the downstream side isn't doing well, meaning there aren't enough places in nursing homes or home help," he concludes.