For most Americans, Thanksgiving is a time to gather with family and friends and celebrate the season. But at America’s hospitals, the holidays are business as usual.
Emergencies don’t take days off, and neither do hospitals nor the caregivers and other healthcare professionals who work at hospitals. They provide care 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year — even on holidays. And thank goodness they do.
In fact, emergency department visits are often higher on average during the holidays. Each year 18,000 people make a trip to their local emergency department for injuries that occur while hanging Christmas lights and décor, with many of these accidents happening on the Sunday after Thanksgiving.
The doctors, nurses, and healthcare professionals at our hospitals are on duty — treating patients, tending to injuries, and delivering complex, life-saving care and mental health services. Eighty percent of U.S. hospitals operate an on-campus Emergency Department (ED), and 45 percent of hospitals offer a trauma center staffed multi-disciplinary team ready to treat patients with the most serious life-threatening injuries. Because most primary care and private practices are closed on holidays, hospitals are often the only option when individuals need medical attention, and no patient is turned away from emergency care.
It’s not only on holidays that hospitals ensure access to care, either. In fact, more than half of emergency department visits occur after normal business hours, and two-thirds of those happen after 8 p.m. when clinics that might offer extended evening hours are typically closed. In 2021, American patients utilized EDs after hours or on weekends more than 83 million times.
If you or a loved one needs medical care this holiday season, hospitals and their caregivers are there for you. We are thankful for our hospitals and healthcare systems and the dedicated doctors, nurses, and other caregivers and staff who ensure reliable access to high-quality care, no matter when we need it.