Clinical

Depending on which data you put the most stick in, anywhere from one quarter to half of all prescriptions for antibiotics are inappropriate. The Urgent Care Association, health systems, individual practices, and various medical societies have all launched initiative to help curb that bad habit and reduce risk for associated deaths from drug-resistant infections. As reported by UCLA Health, one such initiative, Choosing Wisely—launched by the American Board of Internal Medicine more than 10 years …

Recommended management of concussion in athletes of any level seem to change as frequently as sports seasons do. Here’s the latest: According to a statement published by the British Journal of Sports Medicine, while there is no benefit to absolute rest for concussed patients, reduction in physical activity for the first 2 days after the injury is advisable. After that, however, there’s no benefit to that, either. In fact, according to the authors, the latest …

School’s out (or about to be), the days are long, and workers are counting the days until their summer vacation. It’s all fun and games until someone has to go to urgent care. At that point, you and your team need to be prepared for a different slate of illness and injury than you’ve been seeing since last fall began. Slip-and-fall injuries and flu will largely be replaced with bites, rashes, the ill effects of …

Fact: Ketamine (Ketalar) is a legal, approved medication available in the United States as an anesthetic agent indicated for diagnostic and surgical procedures that do not require skeletal muscle relaxation; for induction of anesthesia preceding general anesthesia; and to supplement low-potency agents such as nitrous oxide. It’s also used as an anesthetic agent for animals. More ominous fact: Seizures of illicit ketamine rose 1,100% from 2017 to 2022. Maybe worst of all, a newsletter article …

Who knows what the next COVID-19 “season” may bring in terms of incidence and severity? The virus has been completely unpredictable, to date—although new data are revealing interesting likelihoods, including at least one specific to urgent care. According to a new article published by BMC Infectious Diseases, COVID patients who present to acute unscheduled episodic care (AUEC, which included both emergency rooms and urgent care centers) are more likely to require hospitalization compared with those …

Incidence of multiple sexually transmitted infections has been growing for several years, according to just-released data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Cases of syphilis alone grew at a 32% rate from 2020 to 2021; gonorrhea has climbed steadily over a 5-year period; and chlamydia cases have been picking up after a brief, minor reduction in 2020. At the same time, multiple factors point to a crisis of accessing care. For one, many …

It’s not uncommon for patients to travel to other countries to seek care, often because certain procedures may be less expensive than in the U.S. ‘Medical tourism,’ as it’s called, has certain inherent risk, however, such as availability of follow-up care and flying home too soon after a procedure and increasing risk for blood clots. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has identified a more specific problem that’s of immediate concern, however. The CDC …

In spite of millions of deaths and hospitalizations, as well as economic hardships and general inconveniences, there has been a segment of the U.S. population that believes COVID-19 is no more of a threat than seasonal influenza. Now that vaccines have been shown to be effective and COVID is no longer in the headlines every day, it’s possible more people than ever think that. New data published in a research letter published by the Journal …

As you probably recall, there was a marked difference in rates of respiratory syncytial virus at a certain point during the COVID-19 pandemic. In fact, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reveal that there was essentially no RSV “season” in 2020–21, presumably due to school closures, masking, and social distancing practices. Before the pandemic, RSV cases started to climb in October, peaked in December, and essentially disappeared by April. Now, the Journal …

Lyme disease and Rocky Mountain spotted fever may get the lion’s share of the headlines, but in reality there are any number of tick-borne illnesses that can accompany tick bites and burrowing. That’s part of the message a ProMedica Urgent Care for Kids nurse practitioner  wanted to impart when she participated in an article published by The Blade in Toledo, OH recently. While it may not surprise you, her explanation that the type of illness …