Practice Management
JUCM, The Journal of Urgent Care Medicine has led the way in bringing original, peer-reviewed clinical and practice management content to the urgent care industry since 2006. Now the best has gotten even better by redesigning its website to offer better mobile access, easier navigation and search functions, and the ability to download every print issue ever published in its history. In addition to its award-winning print issues, JUCM will continue to offer web-exclusive content, …
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JUCM, The Journal of Urgent Care Medicine won a Silver Award in the American Society of Healthcare Publication Editor’s (ASHPE) 2018 Awards Competition, takings its place among winners from much larger publications such as The Journal of Family Practice, the American Journal of Critical Care, and the American Journal of Nursing. JUCM was honored in the Case Report category for an original article published in our September 2017 issue and authored by Ralph Mohty, MS4 …
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A new study by the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association indicates that efforts to curb inappropriate antibiotics prescribing are working. The project considered 173 million claims reflecting the care of subscribers <65 years of age who filled antibiotic prescriptions between 2010 and 2016, finding that prescriptions for antibiotics fell 22% for infants, 16% for children, and 6% for adults during that time frame. Patients in the South and Appalachia were more likely to fill prescriptions …
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Among the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ new codes is one that’s likely to be confusing as patients start coming in for flu shots. A quadrivalent vaccine made and distributed by Sequirus is available for reporting, but if billing staff use the corresponding code, 90756 (Influenza virus vaccine, quadrivalent [ccIIV4], derived from cell cultures, subunit, antibiotic free, 0.5mL dosage, for intramuscular use) before January 1, 2018, the claim will be denied. Instead, they’re advised …
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A contingent from the Urgent Care Association (UCA) descended on Congressional offices to school lawmakers and their staffs on the important role urgent care plays in the healthcare continuum. Coinciding with the UCA Urgent Care Convention & Expo at nearby National Harbor, the visit put 15 UCA representatives face-to-face with 75 congressional staffers, including those who work on committees with jurisdiction over Medicaid and veteran’s healthcare. In addition to giving lawmakers a better idea of …
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While convenient access to quality, affordable care has been the defining characteristic of the urgent care setting from its inception, the growth of the industry has been fueled by constant innovation and responsiveness to the evolving needs and preferences of the patient. Today, that includes on-the-spot lab testing. Languishing for hours in a hospital waiting area is a miserable prospect when patients are feeling ill, so they’re likely to choose an urgent care center over …
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Oncology is not likely to pop up on a list of specialties formerly pursued by urgent care clinicians, and patients are not going to be getting chemo at their neighborhood urgent care center. Nonetheless, familiarity with various cancers—and even more importantly, their treatments and complications—is reaching need-to-know status for urgent care providers. Whether it’s sudden concerns over symptoms of infection or even “just” a high fever, cancer patients need immediate care more often than patients …
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Urgent care centers are staffed by more than just highly qualified physicians. Other clinicians—nurse practitioners and physician assistants among them—contribute to the success of a practice and have ongoing educational needs, too. Recognizing that, the Urgent Care College of Physicians (UCCOP) has been renamed the College of Urgent Care Medicine (CUCM). Sean McNeeley, MD, president of the College and a regular contributor to JUCM, revealed the change in a new monthly newsletter called Urgent Caring. …
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Patients have their pick of more urgent care centers than ever before. Unfortunately, they tend to not differentiate one urgent care brand from the next. Throw in all the retail clinics and freestanding EDs, and it’s easy to see why making your location stand out among the rest is such a challenge. Alan Ayers, MBA, MAcc will look more deeply into the issue and propose solutions to help you separate yourself from the herd during …
Read MoreOur authors do the hardest part of publication, researching and writing articles to add to the urgent care literature. Then once we have assessed the big-picture issues during peer review, we polish the manuscripts until they shine, through a process called copyediting. We take care to ensure that after editing, your writing still sounds like you, not like our editors. Here is a partial list of the issues that our editors address during copyediting: Grammar …
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