WORCESTER—Dr. Wayne Altman was visiting a family member in a Boston-area emergency room when he counted 85 people waiting for care. And, by his own account, had to be talked out of trying to make rounds himself.
To Altman, a Tufts University family medicine professor and former Worcester resident, a crowded waiting room isn’t just an emergency department problem. It’s a primary care problem.
Too many patients, he told Worcester officials, cannot get timely access to a doctor before their conditions worsen, leaving hospitals to absorb care that could have been handled earlier—and more effectively—elsewhere…