In early 2008, UCA revamped its annual survey in conjunction with researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard University with the goal of assuring that the UCA Benchmarking Committee’s efforts produced a scientifically valid report. Here we present some of the findings from the landmark survey, to which 436 urgent care centers responded. In this issue: What benefits do urgent care centers provide for their physician employees? Acknowledgement: Adapted from Urgent Care Centers in the …
Read MoreIdentifying, Contacting, and Cultivating the ‘Best’ Contact Person
Identifying the right contact person at a prospective client company begins with a sound, well-conceptualized, and up to date mailing list. Central to the list is the name of the individual responsible for the health and safety of the workforce. This information needs to be verified or updated regularly, something that could be accomplished by having a clerical staff member or high school student call every employer in your database each summer.
Read MoreA Short Course in Tort
John Shufeldt, MD, JD, MBA, FACEP I just completed teaching a semester of Health Law and Ethics at the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University. Over the next few months in this column, my goal is to distill te 40-hour course down to a few pages chock full of practical legal information. Lesson 1: Torts A tort is a civil wrong committed against a person or property interest for which the court …
Read More
The Story of Jonathan-One Week in January
Jonathan is a young man who changed the course of musical theater and would still be making history today if things had turned out differently. Jonathan was born in Mount Vernon, NY in 1960. When he was 22, he moved to New York City to pursue his dream of writing a musical. Like most struggling artists, life wasn’t easy. He spent weekends waiting tables at the Moondance Diner in Soho. He spent weekdays at his …
Read More
Toward Ensuring Patient Safety in Urgent Care
Urgent message: Creating a safety culture in the urgent care clinic starts with proper hand washing before even seeing a patient and ends with transitioning care out of the practice – and includes close attention to every detail in between. The second of two parts. Phillip Disraeli MD, FAAFP The Institute of Medicine’s 1998 Report to Err is Human grabbed media attention by estimating that 98,000 deaths each year can be attributed to adverse events …
Read MoreOf Swine Flu, ‘Chicken Little,’ and the Great Depression
History teaches us so many lessons, most of which we quickly forget until the next history-making crisis. Nothing in history is a more predictable crisis producer than “fear.” Fear sows panic, panic sows irrational behavior, and irrational behavior sows wars, economic disasters, bigotry, and protectionism. When the dust settles, we analyze our missteps and, often, recognize most of the fallout could have been avoided had we learned from history. The Great Depression was a real …
Read More
8-year-old boy experiencing rash on abdomen
The patient is an 8-year-old boy whose mother brings him in with an acute, pruritic rash involving the inferior abdomen. On examination, you find a large, scaly plaque at the midline of the inferior abdomen. You observe the child scratching during the exam. View the image and consider what your next steps would be.
Read MoreAbstracts in Urgent Care – May 2009
Occult Bacteremia is Rate in Young Children with Unexplained Fever Key point: Since introduction of the pneumococcal vaccine, urinary tract infection has become the most common bacterial infection in children who have fever without localizing signs. Citation: Waddle E, Jhaveri R. Outcomes of febrile children without localizing signs after pneumococcal conjugate vaccine. Arch Dis Child. 2009; 94: 144-147. Occult bacteremia and invasive disease are important concerns in children with unexplained high fever. Investigators retrospectively compared …
Read More
26-year-old male who twisted his ankle
The patient is a 26-year-old male who slipped and twisted his left ankle. He is unable to bear weight on the ankle and there is marked local swelling circumferentially around the ankle. Otherwise, he is generally healthy. View the x-ray taken and consider what your diagnosis and next steps would be.
Read More