How Many Times Have You Been to the ER?

i hate ERs. period. when kids were infants we have been there 3 times (hated it all three times). then last year i ended up going twice. severe chest pain once, and severe leg bone pain the second. both times was told to go to a hematologist on monday.

I have asthma, so I've been to ER plenty of times in my life. Sometimes I've had to go to ER because of a upper respiratory infection causing complications with my breathing. I have not had to take my son nearly as much as I've had to go in my life.

I have never been to the ER for myself.

I've taken my youngest daughter twice for an allergic reaction to tree nuts...not going to mess around with anaphylactic shock.

I'm too tired to comment on the ER number thing, but I just wanted to quickly refer to your ooey-gooey eye story. When my son was about 4 or 5 weeks old, he's eyes were incredibly "ooey-gooey". I was a first time mom and wanted to know what I could buy to get rid of that. It was a Sunday so the Dr's office was closed. I called the nurse help line thinking that they could just suggest something I could do at home. The nurse I spoke to totally freaked me out by saying that I needed to get him to the ER immediately. Then when I questioned her judgement and said, "But it's just a gooey eye..." she gave me a huge guilt trip... And I ended up in the ER with my son. The Dr took one look at my son, shook his head, told head that the nurse on the phone was completely over exaggerating and kindly told me what I could do for that situation AT HOME... Of course, I still had to pay a nice chunk of money for that ER visit... Ugh.

We only go in emergencies. I can't fathom why anyone would want to sit in an ER waiting room for a non emergency!

Why do our emergencies always happen at night? Seriously, there ought to be a law! :) The hospital/clinic we use is over an hour away so it's no quick jaunt for us!

Twice in my family. Once for my husband who was in shock due to internal bleeding from a fall -- so a true emergency! And once when I was worried my son had meningitis because he had a fever and kept saying that his neck hurt and didn't want to move his head (turns out it was just hand, foot, and mouth disease and he didn't want to move his head due to sores in his mouth and throat, but I probably would have spent the whole night worrying if we hadn't gone). When I talked to my pediatrician (my pediatrician will take calls after hours, but not see patients) she recommended I take my son to the children's ER, not the urgent care in that case.

Some people may not have the option of other after-hours medical advice, which is probably why they go to the ER for things that could be handled by waiting or going to an urgent care facility.

Going to the ER can be a nightmare of an experience, I would not go unless absolutely necessary.
I have gone for myself a few times due to unbearable migraine headaches, so bad I couldn't move, worse than my normal migraines. I went another time after I fell and broke my ribs.

I took my daughter when she was an infant because she was turning blue - turned out to be from a congenital heart defect. When she was a toddler we went because she fell and broke her arm.

My son went to the ER once when he got a piece of glass in his eye and another time after he fell off his bike and broke his arm.

I would never go for something silly that could wait.

I took my son twice to the ER and my daughter once - they were real emergencies that required immediate care. I have never gone myself.

I think some people have no medical insurance so the ER is their primary care physician.

We half live in the ER.

My son has severe asthma & conorbid pulmonary conditions. When we max out his meds & need to give him higher doses than its safe to do off of machines to monitor vitals, when he needs supplemental oxygen, IV antibiotics... We grab our 'go bag' and go.

He's fine MOST of the time. We'll go weeks, and even months, without being in the ER sometimes. And them we'll be in 3x a week, every week, for a month.

(I could cheerfully throttle parents who bring their sick kids to school against policy. Its NOT "just a little chest cold"... Its exposing my son to another life threatening infection. And finding out your sick kid is in school to win a perfect Attendence award? Alert the ER that they're about to have a "Good citizenship award" foreign rectal body admit.)

Looooove the ER.

Because if we can get him stable THERE, we don't have to be admitted.

____________

We've never just chilled out in the waiting room.

A blue kid = instant access

I've yet to take teh kids to the Er, and I've only been to the ER once myself, when I was 13.

I'm not one to use the ER. I call the Dr and let them tell me what to do. Even when my son was blown up with hives from peanut butter we didn't go to the ER. He was breathing fine, so we handle it ourselves.

I have called the paramedics twice, though. My son fell down the stairs a few times when he was a baby (stupid, stupid gate!!), and he had never screamed the way he was screaming, so I was sure he was hurt.

I always tell the kids that they have to be bleeding really bad or have a bone sticking out to go to the ER LOL I get sooooo annoyed by my students who don't come to class "because I was in the ER all night with my daughter who had a fever of a 102". Come on, 102? Annoying!!

So how many times - 4

Me a car accident where I had a concussion, broken arm and a blown up spleen. Went by ambulance.

Me severe asthma attack after hours

Severe UTI after hours - man this was prob. the worst and the first I listed I almost died. Bladder pain is horrid. I could barely walk I was in so much pain.

DD who went unconscious on me then had a seizure at the age of 2. She was out for over 5 minutes and I thought she had died. So yes I called 911.
Went by ambulance

I go whenever I feel like it's necessary.

I'm not going to sit around and be sick on the weekend or whenever my MD's office and/or Urgent Care is closed. And I'm certainly not going to let my child be sick and suffer when I can take him somewhere and have him diagnosed and treated.

Perhaps some would think the things we go in for are trivial, but I don't care.

We have been to the ER several times. On our insurance plan, we have a nurse line that we can call and discuss symptoms and they will sometimes suggest we go to the ER. Last time - my husband for a severe allergic reaction to an antibiotic and once for shortness of breath. Me- a gallbladder stone when I didn't know I had gallbladder issues and once for a car accident. Over the years, my kids for numerous sports injuries on weekends (concussion, broken bones, MCL tear in knee,), my daughter, once for severe dehydration due to uncontrolled N & V. We only go for emergencies or when directed by medical personnel. We usually go to the private urgent care clinic for when we can't get an appt with our primary care doctor. There are some folks that do use the ER because they don't have a regular physician or have a schedule that is outside the usual hours that a physician's office is open.

My daughter ( 18), never

Me... 4 times in 25 yrs. 1, broken arm, 2, sliced my foot open and needed stitches, 3, accident which resulted in injured knee and shoulder. 4, while pregnant, couldn't pee, they drained my bladder via catheter and I have the record amount drained to this date. Daughter was sitting on something wrong. I wore a catheter for 2 weeks until she shifted. If I had waited much longer, neither of us would be here today.

Hubby... 2 times in 25 yrs. 1. Car accident ( via ambulance) that almost killed him , he came home in 5 days, 2. Allergic reaction to poison ivy

We go if its a TRUE emergency, other than that, it's the doc in a box if our Dr office is closed.

Once for myself - my first day back from maternity leave I slipped on ice at my work's parking lot. My elbow was punctured and wouldn't stop bleeding, so I had to go get stitches.

Once for my oldest son when he was 2 months old and had a hernia--I just saw a bulge and freaked out. It was surgically repaired

Once for my middle son when he was 3 months old and had a high fever. "Fever without a source."

Took my FIL there last month for vertigo, even though my husband (a physician) had already diagnosed him at home with having fluid in his ear. My MIL insisted upon the ER visit, so we were there for 3 hours while he got a scan that revealed...surprise...fluid behind his eardrum. The ER doctor prescribed exactly what my husband had already told his dad that he would prescribe for him.

ETA: Oh yeah, and several years ago I took my SIL to the ER because she was having a panic attack, but thought she was in anaphalactic (sp?) shock. That was a LONG night.

ETA2: Yes, all doctors' offices have an on-call doctor or nurse triage line to answer urgent questions and advise their patients whether it is something that can be treated at home, needs urgent care, the ER, or if it can wait until Monday. Also, lots of people don't realize that many practices have Saturday morning hours for acute cases. Many of my husband's patients are shocked when he tells them that they can go to the urgent care clinic--they assume that it is the same as the ER.

i know! WHY would anyone go there unless it was that or death? i HATE ERs, you can grow a long grey beard in there waiting to be seen, not to mention the bugs circulating that waiting room!
but i swear my in-laws are addicted to it. they seem to thrive on have their emergencies on friday evenings. i honestly think it's an attention-craving behavior.
i've been there myself twice, for one deadly serious and one not-so-serious car wreck. i've had my older son in there twice, for breaking the same damn wrist (or was it three times? i'm getting old!), and my younger three times, once for his older brother hitting him in the head with a baseball bat, twice for breathing issues.
my husband's been twice, once for a terrible flu (which was a waste of time, i should have kept him at home) and once for a kidney stone.
but our broken health system accounts for so many of the non-emergency ER visits. pity.
khairete
S.

I know what you mean. I have a good friend who always has his kids in the ER. I mention the after hours pediatric clinic and how good it is but they keep using the ER. Pisses me off a bit bc I know it's costing our company's insurance a ton of money. But not sure what else I can do. Ive only gone a couple of items in my life. One of my daughters went once bc the clinic couldnit help her. Hr toe had almost been cut off.

We go if our pediatrician tells us to go. We go for the obvious things, like stitches. All three of my daughters have required stitches now. One from a fall onto her head because she lost her balance dancing on a table (of all things), and two daughters for cuts on their hands. My youngest daughter cut herself so badly her pediatrician took a look and was like, "Oh, I can't do that one... take her directly to the ER and I'll call the school for you to let them know she's not attending classes today." She had tried cutting an apple for her school snack that morning.

If it's a weekend and the pediatrician's weekend after-hours aren't even open and there's an issue like a screaming girl from severely burning pee and blood in the urine, then we go. My eldest daughter has kidney reflux when she has UTI's and bladder infections.

We've gone for 104* uncontrolled fever and screaming for no apparent reason in the middle of the night for hours on end (my middle daughter as an infant). I think we had to take her once because her fontanel was bulging very badly during one of her incidents of "high fever of unknown origin."

For myself? It was two years ago? I think? October and I had an ever-increasingly bad attack of diverticulosis. I couldn't even breathe through the pain or walk, and it was so bad that I didn't even have any more urine or diarrhea in me to expel. I ended up in the ER and they checked me into the hospital for nearly a week.

As a child, I broke each wrist and all of my fingers. I've broken both ankles which at each time broke several bones in each foot.

But each time, if the pediatrician office is open we go there first and wait to be referred to the ER unless it's very clear that we'll be sent to the ER. Even then we make a call to the pediatrician first.

Ah, fun times.

But I'll tell you... on a weekend when pediatrician offices and urgent care offices aren't open or in area, pink eye is worth going to the ER. It's highly, highly contagious and needs immediate treatment.

You also don't know what else was going on besides the pink eye. That child could have been really sick and needed additional treatment besides the conjunctivitis.

Try not to judge so hard. It was likely unwarranted.

As a child my Mom took me a few times for broken bones and my sister a few times for stitches.
Knock on wood but so far in 14 years we've never had to take our son to the ER.

Three times

A severe case of the flu where he kept throwing up
Meningitis
Head wound and son needed stitches

Well, acute care (for when you can't get into your primary spur of the moment) and ER are run from the same desk and in the same area at my Mayo clinic branch, so seeing someone sitting in the "ER" may not necessarily mean they will be admitted to the ER...of course, yours may be set up differently.

I have been to the ER a lot of times. Kidney stones, possible broken bones, ACTUAL broken bones, migraines bad enough to lose my vision, etc.

Only one of my children has been triaged into the ER (and that's what's nice about our system...if you need to see a doctor and can't see your own, you go to the ER/acute care desk, they decide whether or not it's an emergency.) and that was for dehydration.

We have been fortunate to have good insurance most of the time, so not much need for the ER..

Only once have I needed the ER.. . I thought I was having a horrible migraine that had lasted for 3 days.. I was so ill.. It was the 4th of July and I had not wanted to bother the doctor.

Turned out I had Spinal Meningitis. They were going to do a spinal tap to verify it.. and then give me some pain medication.. After a while I asked my husband.. "When are they going to do the spinal tap?" He started crying and said "Honey, they already did it."

I told him. If this pain does not go away, please place a pillow over my head and let e go.. He ran to get the nurse and they were able to give me some meds.. Thank goodness they allowed me to go home to a quiet house, The ER was filled with so many patients.. It was thunderous to me.

my last ER trip was in May 2012. I was having gallbladder attacks and knew it needed to come out. At the advice of my primary doctor, when the pain was constant and I was terribly uncomfortable, I went to the ER. Even then, I did not feel as though it was an emergency. but, I was admitted to the hospital and surgery to remove my gallbladder was done the next day.

I've been once for myself when I was bitten by a spider. The spiders round these parts are particularly venemous. I've never taken my children. I've taken my husband once for severe stomach cramps. Turned out he was have an anaphylactic reaction with hives on the lining of his stomach. I've taken my parents during their cancer treatments. They both held special cards to say they were on chemotherapy to get them through triage and waiting ASAP. My niece has juvenile diabetes and she goes to ER quite a bit when she's sick.

I've actually never been to the ER for myself. Took my older daughter there once at 4am because she had been complaining of ear pain since midnight, and the screaming finally got me going (thought maybe her ear drum had burst). Took my younger daughter there on a Sunday morning with a broken arm, but she broke it on Saturday night and we did the whole "let's go to bed and see how it feels in the morning." In the morning, yep, still broken....

So no, we don't rush to the ER for things like gooey eyes. Sometimes I worry that I lean a little too far the other way (in a "let's see what happens" way) but it hasn't hurt us, yet.

I've got 8 kids, so obviously more then the average person. As a general rule if it isn't broken or bleeding (badly) we avoid, avoid. My last round was with my 3 year old. She was 2 at the time and somehow sliced her toe open on something in our trash. We had pulled the bag out to take it to the dump,and sat it on the floor. It was bleeding like no other and I kept doing an internal debate with myself, while my oldest girl went though the trash to see what it could be, which we couldn't figure out by the way. I decided to go in, she needed a stitch, when the bleeding stopped you could see how it sliced down the length of her toe. So it was a good call, but I really debated it.

We've been 4 times. Once when I was pregnant and got severe food poisoning and couldn't feel the baby move overnight, which was usually her busiest time. I was so worried she'd died while I was sick. Ended up in maternity ward for most of the day getting monitored (having contractions and didn't know it) and IV fluids to re-hydrate. (Dehydration being why baby was not moving.)

2 times for daughter, once when she got nursemaid's elbow and once when she swallowed a toy and it got stuck in her throat.

1 time for hubby when he had severe abdominal pain for a few days.

Once, while pregnant and having unusual complications that I couldn't remedy on my own. Our ER was awesome, and escorted me right in due to pregnancy. My sister, a couple of legitimate times. Ooey gooey eye made me chuckle. Your reasons were totally justified. Have to get used to it as our parents get older, though. My dad passed out and was sent to ER. Scary, but fine. TMI.

TF, I couldn't pee either!! You're the first I've heard with the same problem! Had to have catheter. Really romantic, hubby having to learn how to install at home. NO fun.

I have only gone a few times in my life (stiches and a head injury when I was young). My daughter that is 6 has never been to the ER.

Twice. Both times in the middle of the night. Once for my daughter's asthma, once when my other daughter had appendicitis. But we've made numerous emergency trips to the doctor or hospital or urgent care during the day and skipped the actual emergency room.

For myself... Once with a broken wrist. 3x's with my daughter for dehydration during a horrible stomach virus that lasted almost 2 weeks. Too many times to count with my aunt who lives in a nursing home. They ship her off to the ER with a slight fever and often times the fever is gone by the time the ER staff evaluate her because the nursing home gave her Tylenol. Ugh!!

Edit. I went twice...my bladder was not working after I delivered my first child. The hospital sent me home with a catheter and leg bag. My OB removed it a few days later but my bladder still was not working. Had to go to the ER to have a catheter reinserted. (Thanks to TF in Plano who reminded me)

for myself, twice, almost 3 times. first when i was like 10 and while taking a bath ran one of those bottom-of-the-tub flowers up under my toenail like a whole inch deep. they had to cut off my toenail to get it out. then when i had my son. the third (almost) time was last summer, i passed out from heat exhaustion. but after drinking about three gallons of water and resting (we were helping my brother move in 110 degree heat), by the time the ambulance got there i was doing better.

my son, who is 6, three times. once, when he was just a baby, he was not eating (HUGE red flag for him, trust me) and crying nonstop, especially when i would touch his stomach. verdict? gas.

another time, around age 3, he had hand/foot/mouth disease, however, he didn't get any sores on his hands or feet, they were all in his mouth and he hadn't eaten for two days and was just miserable. with that illness, even after seeing a doctor, he didn't eat solid food for nearly a week. they put an iv in him, and sent us home with instructions to give him pediasure shakes.

the last time was when he was four and he broke his arm. ugh...that mental image....

thanks for all the crappy memories lol. i'm going to go find something more cheerful to think about...lol.

I have 2 very active boys (4 & 6). My friend has 2 boys (3 & 5). She and I are always joking about the crazy things they do and wondering how often they're going to get hurt. I thought your post was going to talk about the crazy things kids have done to land themselves in the ER! I was ready for a good look at my future.

Personally I have been to the ER many more times than I ever imagined as a child, but I am very prone to kidney stones and there's little you can do to avoid the ER if you get a kidney stone! (could be 10 am on a Tuesday, and a kidney stone will require an ER trip).

Thankfully my oldest has only been to the ER once. He had croup, and we didn't know what croup was ... very scary, but now we know.

I've noticed reading posts that many people don't realize they can call their doctor, even after hours. Our doctors (my OB, my and my husband's GP and our Ped) all belong to the same clinic. If you call the number after hours with a question, a nurse will help you decide what to do, whether or not a doctor needs to be consulted, whether or not a trip to the ER is warranted. I'm always surprised at the number or people who think if the doctor's office is closed, it's the ER or nothing.

My biggest suggestion to anyone is call your doctor (no matter what time of day) first, then go from there. And never feel bad for talking the doctor on call. That's why they get paid the big bucks!

Broken finger, broken jaw, broken toe, badly injured knee (all sports injuries). Horrible UTI while camping out in a different state on a weekend after waking up in the middle of the night in utter pain!

When I broke my wrist on a Saturday, I waited until Monday for visiting my general dr. (didn't know it was broken).

In terms of my son, the only time he has been to an ER was when he fell in an airport and split his scalp open and had blood gushing every where. He had to get stiches.

No one in our family has ever had an illness that warrants an ER visit.

I don't remember ever going to an ER myself. I have used the Urgent Care clinic for things like a badly sprained ankle/knee (although a doctor visit was actually no use, since I can take Advil and use ice without a doctor telling me to), and a UTI that couldn't wait a couple days for an appointment.

My older daughter was taken to the ER once when her just-diagnosed Mono got very bad overnight and she needed care immediately. My son was taken in once, also. Those are the only times I can remember using the actual ER.

For me: Two preterm labors, two severe cases of bronchitis that required emergency breathing treatments, one reaction to meds, one case of swimmers ear in which my ear swelled shut and I was in more pain than labor and it was 3 in the morning.

My husband: once since I've known him.

Youngest daughter: once for a reaction to a mosquito bite (turns out she's allergic) that caused her ankle to swell to three times its normal size and red streaks to shoot up her leg. Thought it was a brown recluse bite when we took her in.

Middle daughter - once for stitches and once for mono (man she was super sick).

Two sons: never

Then there's the one boy. He is a walking crisis. He has been in for the worst chicken pox known to man (hospitalized 4 days and I swear they came out with the vaccine two weeks after we were discharged) several times for asthma attacks because they wouldn't prescribe him a breathing machine and always in the middle of the night. Once with a broken shoulder. Once with meningitis (three days in the hospital). Once for 2nd and 3rd degree burns on his feet (turns out that wasn't sand he thought he was stepping into but ashes with smoldering coals underneath). It got to where I felt like we could have just asked for our regular room.

I HATE, HATE, HATE ERs. I have never, thank goodness, had a need to take either of my children. I have always used the pediatric urgent care. Urgent care did send my 8-week old DD to be admitted for a high fever/UTI.

My DH has been a few times. Once for bad chest pains and twice for car accidents.

I went once after being rear-ended. I also went once when I was newly pregnant and started bleeding. The on-call nurse told me to go to urgent care. Since the pregnancy test was positive at Urgent care, then strongly recommended that I go to the ER to rule out an etopic pregnancy. It was horrible. I had medical professionals with NO compassion that ran multiple invasive tests. They kept me scared and upset for about 6 hours before getting an attitude telling me that I was NOT pregnant and that the bleeding was my period. They pretty much acted like how dare I waste their time on something so trivial.

After that last experience, I pretty much will NOT go to the ER unless there is a real fear that I have a broken bone or dying.

I wouldn't judge the the woman that brought the infant in with ooey gooey eye. Maybe she works all day and ER was the best option for her. I would rather see her be concerned and get to a doctor than folks who wait too long and become twice as sick. Maybe the ooey gooey eye had been going on for a long time. It's hard to know. I think most people save ER for an emergency, but I've had doctors send us to ER for misc reasons over the years because an emergency sometimes just means do not delay treatment in an attempt to prevent a worsening condition.

Personally, I have only been to ER for severe unexplained pain, broken bones, stitches or at a doctors request.

Twice

I went once in college because I had been coughing for three months. I had already been to the student health clinic twice and the doctors there didn't help at all and I wasn't getting better. The ER didn't end up doing anything to help either... another month or so went by before the cough finally went away.

The other time was for my son. He had been up all night wheezing (at age 2), pediatrician gave a breathing treatment in the morning but the wheezing persisted throughout the day. Doctor said we should go to the ER, where he was given two more breathing treatments before being sent home.

twice with my daughter: first time Urgent care clinic sent us to the ER at the childrens hospital when she was 6 months old and tested positive for RSV, she was having trouble breathing. Second time was a sunday afternoon and she broke out in a rash from head to toe, turned out to be a combination of hand foot and mouth disease and a severe ear infection.

My son once when he spiked 105 fever at 2 years old and wouldnt drink anything.

For me only once when i fell down the stairs and broke my foot.

7 total:

Oldest son - took him when he had a car door slammed on his thumb when he was two. Only other time with him in 15 years was when we saw his pedi during the day for stomach pain and she sent him for an abdominal u/s to rule out appendicitis so the only place to go for that late in the day was the pedi ER.

Myself - once was for a broken wrist, once was for a dislocated knee (via ambulance because I couldn't move at all) once was to get derma bond for a gaping wound on my finger on a Saturday. For that one, I could see the bone and it was still bleeding 12 hours after injury. I would normally have waited until Monday or not had it treated at all but it was the day before my wedding so I didn't want to risk having it open on my gown or need treatment on our honeymoon in Mexico. The last one was when I was pregnant with twins and had an abnormal EKG so I was seen in a cardiac unit and treated for low calcium, potassium and magnesium that was messing with my heart rhythm and causing other problems.

Husband - dislocated shoulder

Basically, injury or acute illness only. Everything else can wait.

We went once for my broken arm and twice for my oldest, for one visit she had her first febrile seizure and I couldn't get her to wake up, then for another visit she needed stitches in her scalp. All good reasons in my opinion.

We recently lost our insurance coverage for about a year. We were turned down for pre-existing conditions. What a fear, not knowing how we were going to financially take care of our family during a medical crisis. It was in the back of my mind all year and we stopped doing some of our usual fun, active things to try to stay "safer" during that time. I don't judge anymore.

My SIL is a respiratory therapist at a hospital and tells me stories about the ridiculous reasons people go to her ER; toothaches, bad colds, etc...

I've been a few times: a broken finger when I was a kid, pre-term labor when I was pregnant, and twice for asthma attacks.

My oldest has been a handful of times: a bad bout of gastroenteritis when she was four, swallowed a quarter when she was four, broke her arm when she was eight, and had an infected lymph node in her neck when she was eight and was super sick from it in the middle of the night.

More times than I want to count. All four of my kids had stitches one per kid. My third has autism spectrum, three melt downs were bad enough to land us in the ER. I forgot I was in my 30s playing soccer against my daughter's eighth grade class and sprained the heck out of my ankle.

Maybe that is it, oh no, one kid sliced her thumb at work, still don't know why they would let her use a knife.

I want to say my oldest did something stupid at college but he managed on his own.

I am sure you have figured out by now we go when there is a potential to do real harm if I don't.

I had sever stomach pain, turned out it was a cyst that burst on my ovary. I was in too much pain, I could not lay down, sit down. and i had to drive home from work like this.

For my daughter, she had a bad cough and was having issues with breathing. Our GP was not open as it was a holiday/weekend.

My son, we were out of town, had a bad rash and fever. Our Dr. told us to take him in. If we were home we would have just gone to the regular doc.

We usually just hit the GP.

For everyone who says our healthcare system is terrible, wait you really will not like what is comi g down the pike. If it is so terrible,why do people come to the U.S. for treatment?

Too many times unfortunately. My son is has epilepsy, so it has been a feature in our lives as he has severe seizures. My duaghter broke her collar bone, so that was another time. My son has RSV virus as a baby, so we took him then, he couldn't breathe. Probably about 10 times. Chaching!

Me? I'm 49. I've gone to the ER 4 times in my life. (includes once in the ladt 16 years.) Severe UTI, corneal abrasion, stitches on thumb, severe knee sprain.
My husband? He's 51. Once that I know of for a choking episode/throat abrasion and MAYBE once for an ear infection in the last 16 years.

My son? He's 10. Never.
We have used the pediatric after-hours clinic for non-emergency care not "worthy" of missing school.

Keep in mind that some people do not HAVE a "family doctor" and that particular mom may have eased. That eye for a week before she sought care. Who knows?