I know that in the late 90’s and early 2000’s that hospital administrations were pressuring ERMD’s to prescribe opiates to patients that were demanding them...regardless of how egregious the patients drug-seeking behaviors were to the ERMD’s...and the ER docs succumbed to those pressures and prescribed the opiates anyway. That’s what they were told to do, and that’s what they did. The hospital administrations didn’t give a rip about what was truly in the best interests of the patients, what mattered the most to them was getting a 5 on the Press-Ganey surveys that were being sent to every ER patient. And clearly what mattered the most to the ERMD’s was keeping their jobs...even though they were violating their oath of “first, do no harm”...in order to do it. Bottom line...it was ultimately all about the money...not only to the hospital administrators, but also to the ER docs.


Every day on this side of the ground is a win.