Practice Management
Patient confidentiality is rightly one of the cornerstones of the medical profession. If we want patients to be forthcoming, they need to feel confident that they can be completely open with their providers without their most private information being shared. However, when policies designed to protect patients instead become obstacles to administering care it’s time to take a hard look at those policies. That’s exactly what the Department of Health and Human Services has done …
Read MoreCOVID-19 has been officially declared a pandemic, and school districts, sporting events, and cultural traditions like St. Patrick’s Day parades are being canceled in order to lower the risk of transmission among large throngs of people. One thing that goes on, however, is the day-to-day operation of the urgent care center—the only difference being that your work is more essential than ever. Secondary to that, of course, is the need to be properly reimbursed for …
Read MoreConcern for both patients and staff has the country’s urgent care professionals leaning heavily on their industry partners for support in the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. In response to the growing of number of people requesting COVID-19 testing and care, Experity has released a  COVID-19 Check-in Triage, and Texting Application to help clinics manage patient check-in from home or the clinic parking lot, facilitate communication with patients, and assess risk before a patient enters an urgent …
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Urgent care centers devoted to pediatrics and women’s health are growing in number and appeal around the country. Now an urgent care operator in Boston is trying another niche service using the urgent care model: care for patients addicted to opioids. Working in partnership with the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (which provided a $2.9 million grant) and the Boston Public Health Commission, the Boston Medical Center Opioid Urgent Care Center promises to do an …
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It’s typical at some point during the flu season for hospitals to re-emphasize that patients should consider going to an urgent care center if they have symptoms of influenza, reserving the ED for truly emergent cases. The COVID-19 pandemic is taking that dynamic to a whole new level, as urgent care centers themselves are wrestling with ways to provide care without inviting in highly contagious people. This begs the question, is this crisis telemedicine’s time …
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Some among the public may view the term social distancing as being sentenced to boredom for an indefinite period, regardless of the intended result of mitigating the spread of COVID-19. Others might welcome it as an opportunity for solitude or spending time with their nuclear family. For a few of your patients and prospective patients, though, the thought of being more or less housebound with minimal contact with the outside world could bring about acute …
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Recommendations to carefully consider which patients truly need opioid pain medications are having their intended effect in emergency rooms across the U.S. According to new data just released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a downward trend in patients receiving a prescription for opioids when they check out of the ED is ongoing. (In the period of 2010–2011, 21.5% of patients left the ED with a prescription for opioids; in the 2016–2017 study …
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With the COVID-19 situation changing by the minute—literally, at times—urgent care providers may feel swamped with competing demands for testing, treatment, and reassuring patients who really don’t have any related worries. Add to that the fact that there’s been little definitive direction from federal health agencies on how to treat patients who do have COVID-19. Now the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has issued a directive that could be helpful—both for patient care and …
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With public fears over COVID-19 at a high pitch, emergency rooms and urgent care centers are being taxed to keep up with demand for immediate attention and care. They’re also learning on the fly how to mitigate risk for infecting other patients, and the staff themselves. Most patients have nothing to worry about, but those who might actually be infected run the risk of infecting others if the right procedures aren’t followed once those patients …
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Patients experiencing atrial fibrillation for the first time sometimes mistake their symptoms for a heart attack and call 911 or rush off to the emergency room. Once they’ve gone through it a few times, and understand that AFib is not high-risk in the short term, they tend to take a more relaxed approach. Some simply call their cardiologist or electrophysiologist so they can track the event. Others may be inclined to visit an urgent care …
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