long ER wait times

By Melina roSS Contributing Writer

Amy Kaku (26C) said it “felt like a drill” was going through her head when she walked out of the Emory University Hospital emergency room (ER) after being told it would be two or three hours before a doctor could see her.

“That’s the prevalence of this issue,”Rachel Wang (26C), who is a friend of Kaku, said. “The longer the wait time, the longer someone is suffering.” sistently lists Emory hospitals as predominantly “overcrowded” or “severe.” wait times to overcrowded hospitals.

In an email to the Wheel, Emory Healthcare reported experiencing longer wait times in ERs due to an increase in respiratory illnesses and the closure of Wellstar Atlanta Medical Center on Nov. 1, 2022, which displaced approximately 50,000 ER visits a year across the remaining metro Atlanta hospitals.

“When patients do go there, it can just be overwhelming from a provider standpoint, you have so many patients to see that you’re just overwhelmed,” Steele said. “Your ability to care for all the patients is impeded, just simply by patient volume.”

Hipple reported seeing a similar situation during her wait at CHOA, noting that the waiting room was “packed.”

By Jaden

Contributing Writer

Emory University’s new African American studies Ph.D. program will send out acceptance letters to the first cohort of students by the end of the first week of February, according to Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of Religion and African American Studies Dianne Stewart, who also serves as interim African American studies department chair.

The Ph.D. program, which is aiming to accept four students out of 105 applicants for fall 2023, is the first African American studies Ph.D. program in the Southeast and the first African American studies Ph.D.

program at a private university in

The African American studies department expects to enroll four new Ph.D. students each year, according to the program description.

The doctoral program comes 52 years after Emory created the first degree-granting African American studies program in the South in 1971.

Stewart and Charles Howard Candler

Professor of African American Studies Carol Anderson, who is on leave for the 2022-23 academic year, helped establish the Ph.D. program.

“The Ph.D. program in African American studies is something that

See EMORY, Page 3

Kaku’s experience wasn’t a lone incident. Izzy Hipple (26C) said she waited five hours to get her blood drawn and receive the results at the Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta (CHOA) ER, while Casey Hampton reported waiting a total of 13 hours at two Emory Healthcare hospitals — seven at Emory University Hospital on Clifton Road and four at Emory Saint Joseph’s Hospital.

“If it were an emergency, I mean, I guess the only place I’d have to go is the ER,” Hipple said. “I’ve just kind of dealt with it myself because I feel like it’s not worth it.”

This follows a rise in patient complaints about long ER wait times across Georgia. Additionally, the Georgia Coordinating Center con-

“We, like other metro Atlanta health care systems, are seeing higher volumes of patients who need care,” Emory Healthcare wrote. Emory Healthcare noted that they are working to hire additional staff to assist with larger patient volumes.

“Longer wait times may occur and we ask for your patience and grace as we serve all of those who need medical attention,” Emory Healthcare wrote. “We are here to support our community and those who come to any Emory Healthcare hospital needing care.”

Low resources

Emergency Medicine Specialist

Jennifer Steele, who has worked in ERs in the Bronx and Long Island, N.Y. for over 20 years and is not affiliated with Emory, attributed long

“There are only so many doctors and they can only do stuff so fast,” Hipple said. “When there’s that many people, I just can’t imagine they could do it faster.”

Some students have reported negative experiences at Emory University Student Health Services (EUSHS) that have led them to go to the ER instead. Hipple recalled that a nurse forgot to take her vitals when she sought treatment for a “serious health issue” at EUSHS. She also said that a physician’s assistant mistreated her.

“She was extremely rude,” Hipple said. “She was very short with me. She did not listen to anything I was saying, and she told me that I came in with too many symptoms, and we could only focus on one symptom at a time.”

See DOCTORS, Page 3