Practice Management
In California, Kaiser Permanente (KP) operates 35 clinics inside Target retail stores, which seems like an unusual partnership on the surface. But in practice, the model helps KP open up capacity for office-based primary care physicians to handle chronic conditions and realize greater value for the system, according to Alan A. Ayers, MBA, MAcc, President of Urgent Care Consultants and Senior Editor of The Journal of Urgent Care Medicine. Ayers also believes the KP Target …
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Walgreens could be out in the market shopping around its VillageMD line of business before long. After closing several of its underperforming Village Medical clinics within the past year to cut costs, the pharmacy retailer suggested a potential sale of some or all of the clinics in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission last week. In January 2023, Summit Health-CityMD and its 370 urgent care and primary care centers became part of the …
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An analysis by the Washington Post and Kaiser Health News examined the recent trend of hospitals launching combined urgent care (UC) centers and emergency departments (EDs). One of the benefits of the hybrid centers is that patients don’t have to self-triage and decide on their own which level of care they need. As it turns out, in the real world of these hybrid centers, many patients can be treated appropriately at the UC level. For …
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Optum is closing several urgent care and primary care clinics in multiple states, according to a report in Becker’s. More than 500 clinical and administrative employees will be laid off in California alone, hard on the heels of other recent staff impacts at locations in Colorado and Florida. Parent company UnitedHealth Group attributes the changes to the evolving needs of the business. The report notes that Optum and its subsidiaries had multiple waves of staff …
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One Medical is facing new scrutiny for allegedly providing questionable talking points for its employees to use in response to anyone with concerns about previous reports that its call center had not appropriately escalated a number of urgent patient calls that should have received immediate medical attention. Instead, the patients were scheduled for office visits. As reported by the Washington Post, One Medical instructed staff to tell those who expressed concern over the controversy that …
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A study of 1,061 hospitals recently published in JAMA Network Open offers a classification of 4 levels of pediatric clinical capability, based on the parameters of the services provided by the hospitals. The hope is that outcomes and care delivery can be compared in a way that is more of an “apples-to-apples” approach using the 4 pediatric hospital capability levels developed by the authors. For urgent care centers, such classifications could be handy for triaging …
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UnitedHealth Group—the parent company of Change Healthcare, which is still reeling from a massive data breach in February—raised its forecast regarding the financial impact of the cyberattack to as much as $2.45 billion on the year. That’s more than double its previous estimate. Meanwhile, UnitedHealth reported Q2 profits of $4.2 billion and revenue increases of nearly 7%, according to Healthcare Dive. After input from federal officials a few weeks ago, the company was put on-task …
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Urgent Care for Kids in Houston, Texas, this week announced the acquisition of 11 Pediatrix Medical Group Primary + Urgent Care clinics, formerly operating under the NightLight Pediatrics Urgent Care brand. Since its establishment in 2011, Urgent Care for Kids has offered traditional urgent care as well as telehealth services, and with the acquisition, brings its total number of clinic locations to 23. Portfolio peek: Urgent Care for Kids is a subsidiary of Goodside Health, …
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The percentage of physicians experiencing at least 1 symptom of burnout has fallen below 50% for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic began, according to the American Medical Association (AMA). The AMA’s 2023 annual survey, which included more than 12,400 physicians from 31 states, revealed a slow decline in burnout from a peak of 62.8% in 2021. Reported burnout levels fell to 53% in 2022 and further decreased to 48.2% in the most recent …
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For years, the Deloitte Center for Health Solutions annual survey of healthcare finance leaders found cost reduction was consistently among the top 3 priorities for organizations. However, the latest survey indicates a shift: cost reduction has now fallen to the bottom of the list of priorities—suddenly ranking at number 17 out of 17 choices. At the same time, around 25% of finance leaders reported missing their operating margin targets over the past 3 years. Behind …
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