Practice Management
The American Medical Association (AMA) developed a new set of policies at its recent annual meeting of the AMA House of Delegates to help ensure that AI is used to augment, not replace, physician decision-making, as outlined in a press release. While the policies aim to address a broad range of healthcare AI applications, they reinforce basic principles for payers and providers that use AI-powered tools. Not surprisingly, the association opposes the use of autonomous …
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The American Academy of Physician Associates (AAPA) released results from a new survey examining salaries, hourly wages, and total compensation for physician associates—also known as physician assistants or PAs. Among practice specialties, urgent care PAs ranked sixth in median total compensation, earning $152,397 annually. In terms of compensation models, 58% of urgent care PAs receive a salary, and 65% are eligible to earn a bonus. Respondents reported a median annual base compensation of $141,449 and …
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The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently announced federal strategies to strengthen the national response to Lyme disease and other tick-borne illnesses. HHS also pledged to reduce Lyme disease cases by 25% by 2035. As part of the new initiatives, a large pilot program led by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and HHS will bring tick-control researchers together to deploy practical strategies to reduce tick populations on wildlife before they can …
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According to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 27.6% of Americans had at least 1 visit to an urgent care center in 2024. By comparison, only 19% of Americans reported visiting a retail health clinic in 2024, suggesting urgent care is the clear setting of choice for on-demand care. Looking at the populations by age, adults ages 18–64 represented the largest portion of the total urgent care visits (28.9%). Children …
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American Family Care (AFC) has announced the appointment of Rhett Lankford as president. In the role, Lankford will report to Chief Executive Officer Jeremy Morgan and help lead AFC’s ongoing expansion efforts. According to the announcement, Lankford brings more than 20 years of experience in healthcare operations and management services organizations (MSOs). Most recently, he served as senior vice president and general manager at NAPA Managed Services, where he oversaw anesthesia-MSO operations across hospitals, surgical …
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A physician leader/owner of an urgent care clinic in Missouri was recently charged with billing fraud and illegal prescribing of controlled substances. According to the Department of Justice (DOJ), the alleged fraud scheme included the physician billing Medicare and Medicaid for medical services as if he had performed them himself—even though the care was actually provided by assistants who had not yet entered residency and thus were not authorized to file claims. It further alleges …
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Big retailers are still attempting to shape new clinical lines of business, betting that some of them will eventually become profitable. Attention has now turned to GLP-1s. Yet against this backdrop, healthcare’s market reality is still leading to scaled-back expansion plans, noticeable exits, and massive financial write-downs for some retailers. The market is rather hit-or-miss right now. For example, Amazon continues to open primary care clinics through health system partnerships (including about 200 sites, according …
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The gas-station convenience store operator QuikTrip Corp. has sold off its 9 MedWise urgent care centers, according to Convenience Store News, effectively exiting the healthcare market. The Saint Francis Health System in Oklahoma has acquired the MedWise centers and will operate them within the health system’s network starting in June, retaining the current staff. While the centers earned Urgent Care Association (UCA) accreditation, growth stalled due to the lack of a hospital network and little …
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Physician burnout rates are declining nationwide, but overall, burnout is still a serious issue, according to the American Medical Association (AMA). The association’s data shows in 2025, 41.9% of physicians reported experiencing at least 1 symptom of burnout—which is an improvement from the 43.2% reporting burnout in 2024 and 48.2% in 2023. By specialty, the highest rates were reported in emergency medicine (49.8%), urological surgery (49.5%), hematology/oncology (49.3%), obstetrics and gynecology (45.7%), radiology (45.2%), and …
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The expansion of WellNow urgent care centers in upstate New York had a measurable effect on patient health and healthcare system performance, according to a study published in Economics & Human Biology. Results show that the opening of WellNow urgent cares was associated with self-rated health increasing slightly (by about 0.04 on a 5-point scale), and individuals in the community experienced 0.3–0.5 fewer poor physical health days per month. There was no measurable impact on …
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