Practice Management
Texas legislators and the Dallas Morning News have both joined the chorus of voices calling for greater regulation of how freestanding emergency rooms present themselves and bill patients. Recent news articles and editorials in the newspaper warn consumers about the high cost of mistaking a freestanding emergency room for an urgent care center, citing a $3,000 bill for out-of-network emergency room services vs a $200 charge for the same services at an urgent care center. …
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Typically, going to the emergency room costs a lot more than a trip to an urgent care center for the same complaint. You’d think insurers would be invested in getting their plan members to recognize the difference and make informed decisions accordingly. The chief medical officer of Innovation Health agrees, and revealed a “decision tree” to help patients choose wisely—and economically. Sunil Budhrani, MD, an emergency room doctor for close to 20 years who went …
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Urgent care and hospital operator Sutter Health is diversifying its efforts to reach patients in multiple settings by opening its own retail-style walk-in clinics in the Sacramento, CA area. Sutter already operated a few retail clinics housed in Rite Aid stores, along with dozens of urgent care centers. Now they’ve opened three such locations of their own in neighborhood shopping centers, with plans to open nine more in the San Francisco Bay area this summer. …
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As we told you here, a study by Accenture found that a quarter of all healthcare consumers have fallen prey to data breaches—with half of them going on to become victims of medical identity theft. While hospitals were the most common source, other settings (including urgent care) were not immune. The Urgent Care Association (UCA) will offer tips to help you avoid such dangers in a live webinar, The Changing Landscape of Cyber Security, Thursday, …
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Aetna Inc. and Humana Inc. have opted not to fight the decision a judge laid down to block their proposed merger based on the presumption that the $34 billion deal would violate antitrust laws. The two companies will continue to operate as separate entities, though the door is still open for either or both to seek other partners. Had the deal gone through, Aetna would have become a kingpin in Medicare Advantage. The implications for …
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The College of Healthcare Information Management (CHIME) has joined 15 other organizations in asking Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price to delay implementation of Stage 3 Meaningful Use and Certified EHR Technology requirements indefinitely. In a February 17 letter to Price, they stressed the importance of reducing regulatory burdens for physicians while “ensuring patients benefit from the best technology…and that the goal of a truly interoperable healthcare system comes to fruition.” The letter singled out …
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A telemedicine ambulance triage system is helping to keep nonemergent cases out of the emergency room in Houston—perhaps indicating one more way urgent care could contribute to improving access to affordable, quality care for patients with non–life-threatening concerns. A briefing on Advisory Board notes that the city’s ED wait times were among the worst in the country 10 years ago, thanks to up to 50% of patients, in effect, seeking primary care in their local …
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New data suggest that efforts to educate patients on when it’s appropriate to go to an urgent care center vs the emergency room need to continue, if not increase. Basically, the survey from CityMD shows too many are not selecting the appropriate setting for immediate care. More than 2,000 Americans 18 and older were asked which setting would be most appropriate for immediate care in eight separate scenarios, from having a child with a 104⁰ …
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Urgent care is a good fit for evolving healthcare marketplaces, ensuring continuing growth for years to come—from $23.5 billion in 2013 to a projected $30.5 billion by 2020, according to a new report from Transparency Market Research (TMR). We’ve told you here that urgent care has been shown to be a popular model for people in the millennial generation (often defined as those born between the mid-1980s and early 2000s), but TMR points out that …
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The ongoing surge in misuse of, and addiction to, opioid pain medications increases the appeal of worker drug testing to many employers, as well as to the federal government. In fact, it’s a cornerstone of efforts to identify people who use opioids inappropriately so they can get help before a tragedy occurs. Since urine tests work and are relatively inexpensive, they’re often employed by urgent care providers who offer occupational medicine services. The problem is …
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