During the study, the study found that heart problems that are life threatening among patients having chest pains but with normal blood tests carry low risk. Even though most people are sent to the hospital emergency department near them due to chest pain, it is not necessary for most people to go through the expensive stay at the hospital as suggested by a new study. Recently released news showed that over 7 million people are sent to the emergency room every year with half of them being admitted at the hospital for further testing, treatment or observation.

Is hospital stay warranted always?

But one can’t help but wonder whether all the inconvenience and cost that comes with staying at the hospital is really warranted. The main objective of this study was assessing of the population of patients can be sent home safely and come back for outpatient testing probably after a day or two. The team of researchers essentially looked at the data collected during over 11,000 visits done by patients who were suffering from chest paints to 3 hospitals between 2008 and 2013 in Columbus, Ohio. In the group, just four people, which represented only 0.06% of all the patients had a heart rhythm that was life threatening, possibly had a respiratory or cardiac arrest or died as found out by the team.

In overall, the researchers found that the short term risk to develop heart problems that were life threatening among the patients was very low. This was actually among the patients having chest pain but those whose cardiac blood tests were normal as well as those with electrocardiograms and vital signs. According to this data, it is clear that admission to the hospital routinely isn’t always a great strategy for the group. It is widely admitted that most people having chest pains are always very concerned of some life ending irregularity or a heart attack. The new finding shows that it is important that the long term wellness of the patient is given priority.

ER with chest pain

In addition, patients who go to the ER with chest pain usually want to be sent home within the shortest time possible. Such are the kind of the conversations that researchers say they have with their patients and he noted that just one of the patients actually wanted to remain at the hospital. For most people, going home and having the tests done the following day is normally what they want most. The researchers recommended that the current national guidelines to be admitted routinely and the patients should be observed and tested in the ER to have an evaluation that is clean. In conclusion, the researchers noted that it is safe to discharge patients having normal results promptly as this will help cut down the ever increasing health care costs.