Journal of Urgent Care Medicine

Occ Med Providers Need Clarity on Legal Marijuana in Workers

Legal use of marijuana could mean high times for urgent care centers that offer robust occupational medicine services—such as workplace drug testing—provided the operators are up on applicable state laws. Twenty-three states and the District of Columbia have enacted medical marijuana laws, though the laws in just eight of those states (Arizona, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, Nevada, New York, and Minnesota) include antidiscrimination or reasonable accommodation provisions for employers. Arizona, Delaware, and Minnesota have laws …

Investing in Employee Wellness May Bring Dividends—Literally

Investments in employee wellness programs appear to benefit the companies that make them beyond attracting quality employees; they may actually be linked to higher stock prices, according to data published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine. Three new peer-reviewed studies looked at the change in stock prices for three portfolios of employers who won awards for their employee wellness programs or who self-scored themselves as having a comprehensive program. In all three cases, …

Clinicians and Occ Med Providers Warned to Mind Safe Immunization Practices

Local, state, and federal health officials are reminding clinicians and occupational medicine providers to follow safe immunizations practices in the wake of serial missteps during a workplace vaccination program in New Jersey. An article published in the December 18 issue of Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report notes “disregard for basic vaccine safety” that set in motion a mad scramble to assess and contain any potential danger to 67 workers whom they believe received shots with …

Protecting Your Position as Market Leader

It’s great to be on top, but when a clinic is “fat and happy,” its focus on sales and marketing can lose its intensity. Consequently, your clinic may be in danger of losing its crown without realizing your leadership position is in jeopardy. This month’s column addresses this dilemma faced by urgent care clinics that are market leaders. Instead of assuming that the “best offense is a good defense,” in some cases the best defense …

Adjust Your Strategy for a Down Economy

There is a broad consensus that our country’s current recession will advance to become the harshest economic crisis we have faced since the Great Depression.On the surface, spiraling unemployment and broad-based financial pressures portend trouble for most urgent care clinics. Yet, crisis inevitably breeds opportunity if clinic owners avoid being caught like a deer in the headlights and proactively move forward.This month’s column addresses economic realities and what clinics can do now—not just to stay …

Keeping Your Ear to the Customer

“Keep your ear to the customer” is a central tenet of effective marketing. Awareness of how your services are used and valued can be especially important in a field like occupational medicine, where the people you treat are often not the ones who contract for those services. There are many ways to keep your ear to the customer, and there are many customer subgroups. “Customers” might include patients, employers, carriers/payors, or specialists. Keeping close to …