TheStreet Makes a Case for Choosing Urgent Care Over the ED

One might expect to hear urgent care’s praises sung by insurers, public health experts, and certainly patients, but props from a website devoted to offering investment insights might be unexpected. And yet, if you go to TheStreet you’ll find an article boldly titled Why Going to Urgent Care Is Better than the ER. As you read the article, it becomes apparent why the site is on the urgent care bandwagon. Cost savings for healthcare consumers and insurance companies is one of the industry’s key attributes, after all. And, in fact, the lead sentence emphasizes exactly that. The article goes on to detail the breadth of services available, though, as well as the extended hours of operation and time likely to be saved by the average patient (some of whom are undoubtedly TheStreet’s readers). Understandably, its key focus is economics, however. Quoting claims data from Cigna, for example, the article notes that the average cost of an urgent care visit in 2016 was $176—compared with $2,259 in the ED.