Posted by yxibow on May 12, 2009, at 1:17:51
In reply to Re: FDA mandates suicide warning on AED labels » SLS, posted by Phillipa on May 11, 2009, at 19:47:51
> Seems also that docs don't hospitalize patients who mention suicide. They just caution them and let them go. Guess the hospitals only take the ones who have already harmed themselves in some way. I remember when hospitalization was used just for med changes. Thing of the past. Phillipa
Because there's no need to hospitalize someone who mentions thinking about suicide. Its a part of being depressed, among other diagnoses. There's a difference between ideation and true concrete plans.
The price of hospitalization for medication changes is so prohibitive it is scarcely used, you're right. Only under exceptional reasons would there be any advantage to it as opposed to outpatient clinics, even which are also not cheap.Hospital beds without anything else are in the low to mid four figures per day.
Even the homeless mentally ill that somehow end up in the hospital, often with multiple complications involving alcohol poisoning and the like, are discharged when the emergency is no longer there. That's a fact here I know and I'm sure in other parts of the country.
This however is not a blanket statement to anyone who has a true 911 emergency and not ongoing thoughts that do not cross that line. Its crass to say it but being here with us is better than a medical bill.
-- Jay
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