I have spent some time in emergency receptions at hospitals waiting to be treated, often in severe pain. Here is what gave me hope every time: If it can wait, it can’t be that bad.

There are a number of injuries for which treatment has severely changed during my short lifetime. A torn ligament used to be operated on in the past but now you are often told to wear a cast for some weeks, take painkillers only when necessary to sleep so you avoid movements detrimental to healing during the day (it’s painful) and to just wait it out. Not X-ray, no surgery, just time to heal.

E: added an all important if to the third sentence.

Same with clavicle fractures, I shattered mine and they used to immediately plate and pin it back in place, but I was given a sling and 7 weeks latter it had pulled it's myriad pieces back together without surgery .

The doctor said had he got that result from an operation operation he would have been thrilled.

Worth noting my hospital is a learning hospital, so it was a hot debate topic amongst the doctors and most of them were surprised they hadn't operated.

Same in Sweden. I’d love to learn about how long queues are when health care is financed with tax (you are not a customer) like in SV/NO vs by the user like in Switzerland (you are a customer)

Look at stats from Israel which has universal care but by private companies competing

In fact this is not even unsaid. My mom suffered a transient ischemic attack last week.

To quote the surgeon: statistically she had a 15% chance of issues in the coming weeks. An operation has a 5% risk of complications, so normally we don't perform one. But 5 is lower than 15%, so let's do it.

Not sure of the math, because I assume the 15% is spread (non-linear) over the 2 weeks, and she was operated at the end of the window, but it is still amazing that all of this is possible.