Practice Management
Time was that retail shopping centers and other commercial spaces were off limits to urgent care operators searching for new locations. The presumption was that a medical facility would not only fail to attract foot traffic, but might even drive away shoppers who didn’t want to run into possibly contagious people on their way into Old Navy or coming out of Panera on their way back to work. Fast forward to 2022 and real estate …
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As of this writing, there remains roughly $150 billion available through the Payroll Protection Program. With the March 31 application deadline for first- and second-time prospective borrowers now in sight, however, the window for obtaining support that might help you keep your business afloat is closing. Some of the community banks charged with facilitating loans are targeting niche customers within certain markets—which could work to your advantage—such as businesses with fewer than 20 employees. Obviously, …
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Urgent care operators who missed the boat on the first round of Paycheck Protection Program loans from the Small Business Administration—or those who have already taken part and need additional help—take heed: the window for both the first and second draw is open again. As in the first leg of the program, loans are actually issued through particular banks, though the SBA has set up a lender match feature to help applicants connect with lenders. …
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The Small Business Administration just released new details of its Paycheck Protection Program—including which businesses (including urgent care centers) will be identified publicly by name; the status of “loan forgiveness” considerations; and extension of the PPP through August 8. The SBA released the names of businesses that borrowed more than $150,000 through the PPP. Businesses that borrowed less remain anonymous. The SBA has not started accepting applications for loan forgiveness yet. Banks that are facilitating …
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The United States Department of Labor has ordered a Mississippi urgent care operator to pay $147,622 in back wages to 16 nurse practitioners who were illegally deprived of overtime pay. The operator classified the NPs as independent contractors rather than employees and, as such, paid them a regular hourly rate—even when they worked more than 40 hours in a week, which is where they ran afoul of the law. The Department of Labor found that …
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An article just published online by NBC News takes potshots at the cost of healthcare marketing, implying (and outright stating, through “experts” quoted in the piece) that it raises healthcare spending unnecessarily and causes some consumers to fret over diseases they didn’t even know existed. It cites data, published recently in the Journal of the American Medical Association, revealing that overall healthcare marketing spending is up to $30 billion a year (nearly twice what it …
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CNBC, The Washington Post, and LinkedIn have all reported on the growing phenomenon of workers who “ghost” their employers—essentially, leaving their job without providing notice and cutting off all contact with the company without explanation. While the poor ethics and etiquette of that practice are beyond question, there could be serious legal consequences if it happens in the urgent care setting. And it does happen—even among physicians and other clinical staff; some leave at the …
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Just weeks ago, we brought you an exclusive article on How to Deal with a Liar in your urgent care practice. Now comes a post on the website The Hill that looks at lying on a grander scale: The United States healthcare system, in which lies are often generated and promoted in pursuit of short-term financial gain, according to authors Lawton R. burns and Mark V. Pauly. In their opinion piece, the pair reflect on …
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You can save yourself major headaches—and maybe even a lot of bad press—by ensuring the payment terms your urgent care operation accepts are well known to your patients. Ensuring your staff knows how to communicate clearly and compassionately with people who come to your locations for care will go a long way toward keeping the peace even when conflicts occur, too. That message may arrive a little too late for one Massachusetts urgent care center, …
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For every independent urgent care operator who claims facility fees give them a competitive edge over their health system counterparts, there’s a hospital-based numbers cruncher licking his lips over the revenue those fees provide. Either way, with more and more hospitals bringing single-location or small-group operations into the fold, patients may start to wonder why the same care provided by the same providers in the same location no longer costs the same. If you’re a …
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