I volunteer on a med/nursing unit at Orlando Health, where I round on patients and help with their comfort and also set up patient rooms or help stock materials across the floor. While volunteering, I overheard a conversation that I had never thought about: a lot of hospital and ER visits didn’t have to happen at all.

I did some research, and The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality confirmed what I had heard. They report that an estimated 13% to 27% of ER visits in the U.S. could have been handled in a doctor’s office, clinic, or urgent care, which they estimated could save around $4.4 billion a year. These are visits for conditions that are preventable or treatable with good primary care, without the need to go to an emergency room.

When I shadowed a foot and ankle podiatrist a few months ago, I saw this too. A lot of what the doctor was treating were conditions that got worse over time, because people didn’t have consistent access to basic care earlier. By the time they came in to see the doctor, the problem was bigger than it needed to be because they previously did not have access to treat it because of things such as a lack of money.

That’s the pattern I keep seeing the more I spend time in healthcare. We tend to wait until something becomes an emergency, then deal with it in the most expensive and stressful way possible. It’s like ignoring a small leak until the ceiling caves in and everything else just goes horribly.

The fix isn’t really about emergency rooms though. It is more about everything that comes before patients decides to go to one. If people had a regular doctor, could afford a visit, and could get in to be seen when a problem was still small, a lot of those emergency visits would never happen.

I don’t think the answer is to tell people to stop going to the emergency room. People go to the ER because they don’t have another option. The real answer is giving them that better option earlier through prevention. That will always be cheaper and easier on everyone.