Syracuse emergency rooms are jammed, dirty and frustrating; waits are among worst in U.S.

Syracuse, N.Y. — Michael Carapella expected to get care quickly last summer when he went to St. Joseph’s Hospital emergency room with chest pain.

Just eight days before, St. Joe’s doctors had propped open Carapella’s right coronary artery with two stents after he suffered a heart attack. He was scheduled for open heart surgery in late September to fix the other clogged artery.