Urgent Care News

When COVID-19 first came to widespread attention, it appeared that the virus was not high-risk for children compared with (especially older) adults. While that may be true in the strictest sense, as more cases have come to light and been the subject of scrutiny it’s become clear that the associated novel multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) can have a severe impact on children. Now the journal Gastroenterology has published data revealing that gastrointestinal signs …

Because COVID-19 is a novel virus that was at first dismissed as a problem unlikely to affect the U.S., only to spread very quickly once it reached our borders, the healthcare system was largely caught off unprepared to prevent the virus or treat those afflicted. Urgent care was certainly no different. It hasn’t taken long for our industry to start catching up, though. In concert with the American College of Emergency Physicians, the College of …

New cases of COVID-19 are no longer making news every day, thanks to the fact that the much-discussed “curve” flattened. However, as restrictions start easing the number of cases is on the rise again. In fact, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the U.S. had the largest jump in daily cases in the world—a 36.5% increase in a single day. Data from the Federal Emergency Management Agency confirmed the figure. Worse, average …

The Lancet has taken the extraordinary step of retracting a paper that garnered worldwide headlines when it was published in May. That article had suggested that hydroxychloroquine—purported by some to be a possible treatment for, or agent to prevent COVID-19—was associated with higher rates of ventricular arrhythmia and death in patients with the virus. While there is no evidence that the conclusions are incorrect, Lancet says it withdrew the article at the request of three …

If not technically a pandemic, cabin fever is definitely running rampant across the U.S. Especially now that the weather is warmer, social distancing restrictions are relaxing a bit, and school years are ending, people are aching to get outside. Ticks await, ready to feast—and you need to be ready to assess for various associated diseases and provide care as needed. One challenge is that patients may complain of symptoms but not mention that they’ve been …

The World Health Organization made headlines for stating that transmission of coronavirus by infected, asymptomatic people “very rare”—only to clarify hours later that asymptomatic carriers do contribute to spread of the virus. The WHO also acknowledged that more study is needed to understand what role asymptomatic patients play in infecting others. Complicating the issue is a shortfall in health literacy; according to the WHO, many patients mistake the word asymptomatic to mean having only mild symptoms, …