You do, but the assessment may turn out to be a poor one. I went to A&E once at Addenbrooke's with severe stabbing chest pains on a busy Saturday night with many people waiting and was assessed as a potentially critical case and was admitted to a bed and surrounded by doctors very quickly. As it happened the cause turned out not to be serious at all (although painful enough to be given morphine). The friend I referred to was sadly mis-assessed in the opposite direction.