Practice Management
Dollar General Aims to Supply Healthcare to the Underserved. Drugstore Clinics Should Take Note Dollar General has seen a lot of succes swhere many retailers couldn’t be bothered—by offering low prices with sometimes minimal selection to customers who may not have many other options. It’s worked, though, with some of their stores evolving to offer the only access to fresh fruits and vegetables for miles around when mom-and-pop grocery stores in rural communities close up …
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Not too many urgent care operators can boast that they offer top-notch medical care at any hour of any day, to any patient population. The urgent care center at the James E. Van Zandt VA Medical Center in Altoona, PA is set to join their ranks on August 1, though, offering those who have served this country nearly unprecedented access whenever they need it. In a report broadcast by WTAJ news, facility director Sigrid Andrew …
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You just can’t beat Amazon when it comes to stocking items on the back-to-school list once everything’s been sufficiently picked over at Staples and Walmart. The company has tried in various ways to capitalize on its good name in entering the healthcare marketplace, to no avail. Now they’re trying a different tactic: buying an already established concern. The virtual retail colossus announced a $3.9 billion deal to take over One Medical and its 125 brick-and-mortar …
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JUCM noted some time ago that the COVID-19 pandemic has been taking a toll on urgent care workers (see The COVID-19 Pandemic Is Making Burnout Worse for Physicians Already in Crisis). Now a new report published by JAMA Network Open is providing data bearing that out—along with a possibly surprising nuance. Childcare challenges and other issues related to the pandemic have amounted to increased stress and burnout, leaving an ever-growing number of healthcare providers looking …
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You want the best, most reliable clinicians for your patients. And their performance is essential to your future success. There’s more to capability than experience and clinical skill, however, and there could be red flags in an otherwise stellar candidate’s past that they’d be unlikely to mention in an interview. The headlines out of Clallam County, Washington offer a bracing reminder of that as an emergency room physician there has been arrested and charged with …
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JUCM News first alerted readers to rising cases of monkeypox in May. At the time, the news from around the world was more of an oddity than a cause for concern. The novelty has now worn off, however, as the World Health Organization just upgraded the status of monkeypox to an official global health emergency. As noted in The New York Times, the global caseload now exceeds 16,000 in 75 countries. This is a rare …
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For the first time in almost a decade, someone has been diagnosed with polio in the United States. Per a report from CNN, it’s suspected that the virus identified in the Rockland County, New York man originated in another country. While he himself had not traveled internationally recently, it’s believed that he was infected by an individual who was vaccinated with the oral vaccine still used in some areas of the world. (The U.S. stopped …
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JUCM News readers are well aware that there’s been tremendous merger-and-acquisition activity in the urgent care marketplace in 2022—and it’s certainly not cooling off in the midsummer period. Most recently, WellNow Urgent Care acquired Physicians Immediate Care and its 55 urgent care and occupational medicine facilities in Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin. That brings the total number of WellNow centers to 128 in six states. And Fast Pace Health just completed its previously announced investment in …
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Too many patients assume that a supplement labeled as “natural” is unlikely to cause possibly dangerous side effects. That risk is compounded when the person taking the supplement is a child. The potential for negative side effects and toxicity is underscored in an article just published by the Journal of the American Medical Association. In it, the authors cite data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showing a 530% increase in pediatric melatonin …
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Around 60 million Americans live in areas defined as “rural,” with local hospitals being the most viable option for care—assuming they can find one. That’s getting increasingly difficult, however, as illustrated in an article just published by Becker’s Hospital Review. Since 2011, 76 rural hospitals have shut down across the country, leaving too many patients in a precarious position when it comes to their healthcare. Texas leads the way with 15 closures, but 21 other …
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