Without question this is appropriate care and will allow more attention to more serous problems. It will also offer more personal and thorough care by being treated at a community health center. It will not lower costs however. If there are less ER visits, this does not change professional or maintenance staffing at the hospital. The same equipment stays in place with its technicians at the ready. Therefore no expenses have been reduced for the ER and with decreased revenue, it will be made up in higher prices. You can count on it.

Wasn't one the theories behind the mandate that if people had health insurance they would get care from their primary care providers rather than in expensive places like the ER? This theory has been proven incorrect in the real world. A study published in the NEJM in Oct 2011 compared ER usage in MA after RomneyCare with that in other states. There was no difference in utilization. The reality is the mandate is a failure. Health care and health insurance are two completely different things. Requiring people to have health insurance doesn't mean they have access to health care.

If they want to stop all the ER visits just tell "El Mumbaito" the mayor to stop inviting illegals to come to Boston to get free care that us taxpayers work for. Think of all the spanish interperters they use and it takes time and money when they don't speak Engish they should be checked out to see if they belong here.

If Partners would accept all of the health insurances, instead of just the ones that pay the most, then patients would be able to go to Partners doctors in their offices. Partners obviously won't put their money where their mouth is, since they would not then be able to pay their network doctors twice as much as other doctors.

Hospitals should expand their urgent care centers so that non Emergency or life threatening, albeit, urgent visits can be absorbed internally with reasonable alacrity.