Practice Management
While patients and payers may expect urgent care to be available 7-days a week, approximately 20% of urgent care centers are closed on Saturdays, and approximately 30% are closed on Sundays, according to a February 2025 analysis of 14,301 centers by National Urgent Care Realty and Urgent Care Consultants. Of the centers open 7 days a week, 24% open and close at the same time every day. Otherwise, centers that are open weekends are likely …
Read MoreUrgent message: The “in office ancillary services exception” to the Stark law enables urgent care centers to offer a range of services in-house, but complications arise when the urgent care operation consists of multiple locations. Urgent care centers are almost certainly familiar with the Stark law, a federal conflict-of-interest statute designed to help curb physician self-referral. It is a particularly exacting regulation, but there are numerous exceptions that may help healthcare providers avoid liability—the common …
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