Twice, in the past three days, while driving in our semi-rural neighborhood,we've had momentary scares from drivers coming in the opposite direction on two lane roads... distracted for some reason and heading toward me in my own lane. I guess that the current efforts to reduce distracted driving brought this closer to home, and I started thinking about the patient load on the hospital emergency rooms.
Here's a website that is overwhelming, with statistics of all kinds, but opened my eyes as to how often, at what age, and what reasons we go to emergency rooms.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/ahcd/nhamcs_emergency/2011_ed_web_tables.pdf
Never thought of age as being a major factor, but find myself in the highest risk group. Understandingly not something we think about or fixate on, but after looking at some of the many charts and analyses, a new perspective on what is going on in the world about us, and a realization that we are very vulnerable.
More than you'd ever want to know, but kind of interesting to browse the numbers and to realize that we aren't immune to human frailties.
Am thinking back over the several years, and while I think of myself as being generally healthy... need two hands to count our unplanned visits to doctors, dentists and emergency rooms.
Any idea of your own risk probability?
Here's a website that is overwhelming, with statistics of all kinds, but opened my eyes as to how often, at what age, and what reasons we go to emergency rooms.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/ahcd/nhamcs_emergency/2011_ed_web_tables.pdf
Never thought of age as being a major factor, but find myself in the highest risk group. Understandingly not something we think about or fixate on, but after looking at some of the many charts and analyses, a new perspective on what is going on in the world about us, and a realization that we are very vulnerable.
More than you'd ever want to know, but kind of interesting to browse the numbers and to realize that we aren't immune to human frailties.
Am thinking back over the several years, and while I think of myself as being generally healthy... need two hands to count our unplanned visits to doctors, dentists and emergency rooms.
Any idea of your own risk probability?