Practice Management
Urgent care clinicians practice where the rubber meets the road—treating patients who feel so bad they cannot wait to be seen by their primary care physician. The downside is that physicians often don’t know patients well—which means they need to be vigilant for opioid addicts and “patients” who are actually looking to obtain drugs so they can sell them for their own profit. This has given birth to a movement seeking to lower prescribing rates …
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Patient population data rooted in urgent care visits could be invaluable to healthcare systems, especially with patients who don’t have a primary care physician. And, of course, urgent care operators want to be included in local provider networks. Current and emerging technologies, as well as growing emphasis on value-based care, make this the perfect time to strike formal partnerships to exchange electronic patient data, providing a path for both parties toward their goals. It’s incumbent …
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Urgent message: Undiagnosed type 2 diabetes mellitus affects more than 9 million Americans. This first part of a two-part article focuses on evaluation of diabetes screening for the adult urgent care patient in whom diabetes has not been diagnosed, using effective early disease-detection strategies to reduce the long-term burden of diabetes. How this article helps you: by providing data to assist you in deciding about screening in your center. Introduction There are now more than …
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St Vincent Health in Indiana is the latest system to join a growing trend in the U.S.: opening small “footprint” hospitals—multispecialty facilities with an emergency room or an urgent care center to lower volume and offer easier access in conjunction with their main campuses. In St Vincent’s case, that amounts to four new 24-hour emergency micro-hospitals and three ambulatory care centers in the Indianapolis area. Each will have seven outpatient beds and eight in-patient beds. …
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Urgent care clinics that stock the acetaminophen overdose antidote acetylcysteine should check their inventory for three specific lots of the drug distributed by Arbor Pharmaceuticals under the trade name Cetylev. Arbor has recalled lot numbers 005C16, 006C16, and 007C16, with expiration date 02/2018 and with National Drug Code (NDC) 24338-700-10 of the 500 mg effervescent tablets for oral solution because of an inadequate seal of the blister pack. The Food and Drug Administration says the …
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Baptist Health South Florida is encouraging patients who are concerned they may have been exposed to Zika virus, but who do not have symptoms, to visit the system’s urgent care centers in order to prevent clutter in its emergency rooms. That news comes on the heels of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention adding another location for pregnant women to avoid in Florida, along with suggestions that they and their sexual partners consider postponing …
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The rapid growth of freestanding emergency rooms—as well as consumer outrage over controversial billing practices—continues to draw the attention of researchers and legislators around the country. Most typically found in affluent neighborhoods, some freestanding emergency centers can be hard to distinguish from lower cost urgent care centers, setting expectations for some patients that they’ll receive an urgent care-size bill. When the cost more closely resembles the cost of a trip to the ED, patients cry …
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Anecdotal evidence that urgent care is a safe, lower-cost alternative to the emergency room and a more convenient setting than the primary care office is abundant. What about properly designed research that provides hard data, though? The Urgent Care Association of America has made great strides toward validating industry standards with its annual, voluntary benchmarking survey, but otherwise the industry has lagged in researching itself. Now Intermountain Healthcare has taken a step toward filling the …
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URGENT MESSAGE: Every patient needs vaccinations at one point or another. Yet, some urgent care operators shy away from immunization campaigns for fear that they’re financially risky or are simply too much of a hassle. However, risk can be greatly diminished—or even eliminated—with proper planning, basic understanding of storage requirements, and ensuring your clinic is offering what the community you serve needs. Jack Roberts is an expert marketer who specializes in promoting and growing physician …
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A 35-year-old man with a history of human immunodeficiency virus presents with smooth, skin-colored pearly papules with central umbilication on his cheeks, chin, and lateral neck. View the image taken (Figure 1) and consider what your diagnosis would be.
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