The Habits That Actually Keep People Out of an Emergency Room

Four posts on this site were about willpower — resolutions, not quitting,
turning intention into habit. This is not that article, because from where we
sit the habits that reduce emergency visits are not the ones people resolve to
start in January.

They are duller, smaller, and mostly about deciding things in advance.

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1. Take your medication on the days nothing is wrong

The highest-yield health habit there is, and nobody writes a January post
about it.

A meaningful share of what comes through an emergency room is a chronic
condition that drifted — blood pressure medication skipped for a fortnight, an
inhaler that ran out, insulin adjusted by guesswork during a bad week, a blood
thinner missed over a holiday.

What actually helps, in order:

• Attach it to something you already do without deciding — brushing teeth,
  the coffee machine, locking the door. A habit that needs a decision is the one
  that fails on a bad day.
• Refill before you are down to the last few. Running out on a Sunday is how
  a two-week gap starts.
• One list, kept current, that somebody else could find. Paper on the fridge
  or a photo on your phone. This is the single most useful thing you can bring
  to an emergency room, and it is worth having for the visit you do not plan.
• Ask about simplifying. If you take several things at several times, ask
  whether it can be consolidated. People manage simple regimens and abandon
  complicated ones.

Routine slips hardest over holidays and travel, which is precisely when the
consequences arrive.

2. Decide what you will do before you need to decide

This is the habit that appears on every article on this site, and it is worth
naming as a habit rather than repeating as advice.

• Know where you would go, and tell the people you live with. At 3am nobody
  should be searching.
• Know the short list of things that mean call 911 rather than drive — chest
  pain, stroke signs, trouble breathing, a bad bleed, a seizure.
• Set a limit in advance when you start waiting. "If this is not better by
  nine, I go in" beats reassessing every twenty minutes while in pain, because
  the judgement you use to reassess is degraded by the thing you are reassessing.
• Know roughly what it costs. We do not balance bill any patient, and you
  will never pay more than your in-network deductible and coinsurance — worth
  knowing before it is a reason to hesitate.
  How billing works

None of that requires motivation. It is five minutes once, and it works on
the night you are least capable of working things out.

3. Two boring things that prevent the injuries we see most

Fall-proof the house before anything happens, if you or someone you live
with is over 65. The medication review is the biggest lever, and it is a phone
call rather than a project.
Falls: what to do after one

Pool fencing and a named watcher, if there are young children. Nothing else
in child safety is close.
What sends children to the ER

Neither is a habit you maintain. They are jobs you do once, which is why they
work.

4. Hydration, because this is Arizona

The one conventional health habit that genuinely changes emergency volume
here. Drink before you are thirsty in summer, and treat any long time outdoors
as needing a plan rather than good intentions.
Dehydration

5. Have a clinician you can actually reach

Not us. Someone who knows you.

An emergency room is good at the unplanned and bad at continuity, and a great
deal of what we see would have been smaller if someone had been managing it.
If you do not have a primary care clinician, getting one is the most valuable
health admin you will do this year — and it is the thing most often skipped by
people who feel well.

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What we are not going to tell you

We are not going to tell you to exercise more, sleep better and eat greens.
All three are true, none of it is news, and an emergency room repeating it adds
nothing.

And we are not going to do motivation. The four posts this replaces were
built on it — don't be a quitter, turn resolutions into habits — and from where
we sit, the habits that matter are not failures of willpower. They are
failures of setup. A pill taken at the same moment as a daily routine does not
need resolve. A decision made in advance does not need to be made at 3am.

That is a more useful thing to hear, and it is the only version of this
article we can honestly write.

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El Mirage ER — open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.
12000 N El Mirage Rd, El Mirage, AZ 85335 · (480) 237-4922
Walk in. No appointment, no referral.
If this is a medical emergency, call 911.

This article is general information, not medical advice, and cannot account for
your history or medications. Do not change any medication without speaking to
your own clinician.

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Sources

The guidance in this article about when to seek emergency care is drawn
from these public sources. Each one is linked so you can read it yourself.

• MedlinePlus (National Library of Medicine) — Exercise and Physical Fitness — https://medlineplus.gov/exerciseandphysicalfitness.html

This article is general information, not a diagnosis, and it cannot account
for your history or medications. If you are unsure, call us on (480) 237-4922
or come in. If it might be an emergency, treat it as one and call 911.

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