Nice story from the ER doctor and nice to know charity and human soles are still alive and well out there. We hear so much negativity today and nice to hear from dedicated and generous health care workers, as the patient had no insurance but needed care. BD
“Well, probably mostly free. The guy may be able to pay some of his bill (but I doubt very much). Last night I had a young man, recently graduated from college with no insurance and only a part time poorly-paying job who came in after a stupid motorcycle accident. He was fooling around with no helmet in a parking lot at 15 mph and crashed 
into a metal wire fence. He broke his forearm and severely lacerated his face (just under his one nostril), and two fingers on his dominant hand (almost cutting his extensor tendons) , bruising his knee and shin,and got road rash on his other hand and leg. All told, I put in about 50 sutures, including deep ones. Splinted both fingers, reduced his broken radius as best I could and then splinted it, and cleansed off all his abrasions. It took me about 2 1/2 hours of work. A plastic surgeon or orthopod or other surgical specialist would have easily charged 10K for all of that work (who knows, maybe more!). I did it for free (well, as I said before, he may try to pay some of our bill but I don’t think we’ll get much). He was a good, nice kid (just did something stupid - and was not drinking) who was very thankful so I did not really mind. While I did this, the ER massively backed up even though there was another doc and a PA working. I would have LOVED to call someone in to help but I knew they would refuse since he had no insurance. The best I was able to do was to get the on call orthopod to see him in his office next week - where he will hopefully arrange for him to have his radius surgically fixed through the clinic system. I would love to tell them about cases like this that I don’t ask them to come in for when they balk about coming in for minor cases with insurance!”
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