NEW YORK, NY June 01, 2009 —With many emergency rooms filled with people concerned about swine flu, City Comptroller Bill Thompson is calling for greater coordination between hospitals and neighborhood health clinics.

THOMPSON: Let's notify patients about some of the ambulatory care facilities that surround these hospitals. Then Let's make sure there are personnel coverage there.

REPORTER: A spokesman for the Jamaica Medical Center says that fears about swine flu more than doubled patient traffic into the emergency last week. He says those numbers seem to be declining.

The hospital spokesman didn't have figures on how many people are truly sick and how many are what doctors call "the worried well."

Thompson gave a speech in Jamaica and said that two recent hospital closures in Queens, St. John's and Mary Immaculate, were straining hospitals even before the latest concerns about swine flu.