Migrant access to emergency health care: the significance of emotions

Migrant utilisation of emergency services is typically framed as either premature or delayed, positioning temporal responsiveness as central to patient outcomes and system efficiency. While these studies acknowledge structural barriers, such as system navigation, affordability and access, they pay less attention to the role that emotional and cultural processes might play in shaping how migrants recognise, interpret, and act upon health crisis. Building on recent attention to emotions in healthcare, this study interrogates the role of emotions in the emergency healthcare practices of older Indian migrants (aged 50+) living in Melbourne, Australia. Reflecting on qualitative interview and focus group data, we examine how emotions such as fear, shame, hesitation, and uncertainty shape emergency health practices. Our findings indicate that emotional responses are not incidental but rather emerge as central to the way care is navigated, delayed, or resisted. These emotions emerge from culturally specific understandings of illness and family responsibility and are further shaped by the challenges of adapting to unfamiliar healthcare systems. By centring emotion as both socially and culturally embedded, this study contributes to understandings of how health decisions are shaped not only by structural issues such as access, but also by being deeply situated in moral and emotional worlds. • Provides insights into how older Indian migrants perceive emergency care. • Identifies emotions as central to how people use emergency healthcare. • Fear, hesitation, worry and gratitude shape perceptions of emergency care. • Emotional memories of healthcare shape current responses and expectations. • Argues deficit views of migrant care fail to recognise role of emotional labour.