Practice Management
Milwaukee-based Aurora Health Care may soon start offering a new digital concierge that allows patients to enter their symptoms on a computer or mobile device and receive real-time advice on what the most appropriate care site might be. The chatbot, called Bouy, appears in a web browser, understands “natural language,” and adapts to the user’s answers. It operates, essentially, like an electronic decision tree by asking the user a series of questions aimed at directing …
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It may be premature to call it a trend, but stories of urgent care operators taking their services directly to patients continue to pop up around the country. It’s becoming a more appealing prospect to payers, too. Most recently, Mercy Care Plan granted its members access to DispatchHealth in the Phoeniz, AZ metropolitan area. The service allows patients who may be too ill or frail to travel to the emergency room or an urgent care …
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Updates to pain guidelines in the era of opioid addiction have focused on treatment of chronic pain, generally. The latest edict takes a close look at the practice of prescribing narcotic medications for acute pain, however—a subject all the more relevant to the urgent care provider. Improving the Safety of Opioid Use for Acute Noncancer Pain in Hospitalized Adults: A Consensus Statement from the Society of Hospital Medicine recommends limiting the use of opioids to …
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Facebook is in hot water in the wake of revelations that Cambridge Analytica gained access to user data inappropriately. Now the social media pioneer admits that, at the same time, it was on the hunt for healthcare data on its own users, having asked hospitals to share information on illness and prescriptions for unnamed patients. Paradoxically, the company says it sought the information in order to help “major U.S. hospitals” identify patients who may need …
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It may come as no surprise to healthcare industry veterans, but there are fresh data that shed new light on greater utilization of emergency rooms by pediatric patients in neighborhoods viewed as disadvantaged. Statistically, kids who live in “low opportunity” areas are roughly 33% more likely to visit an urgent care center or the ED than children who grow up elsewhere. It’s not just scratchy throats and sudden fevers sending them there, either; the less-advantaged …
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Regular readers of JUCM News know mergers between large corporations in previously disparate markets (eg, insurance and provision of healthcare) have been coming fast and furious. Simultaneously, fewer newly minted physicians are choosing primary care as their practice of choice as on-demand healthcare continues to grow. None of these trends occurs in a vacuum, of course—in fact, it’s likely that there are directly links among them, as pointed out in an article just published in …
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Key metrics—also known as key performance indicators (KPIs)—are driving your business, whether you know it or not. And if you do know it, you’ll be able to capitalize on them to ensure continued growth and prosperity in your urgent care operations. If you don’t…well, you’ll be left just hoping for the best. Whichever camp you fall into, you can gain new insights into measuring and capitalizing on KPIs in a webinar to be hosted by …
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A new report published online in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Vital Signs reveals that the CDC and health departments across the country identified more than 220 instances of germs with “unusual” antibiotic-resistant genes last year. Anne Schuchat, MD, principal deputy director of the CDC, called it “reassuring” that the resistant bacteria were identified because that’s the first step toward finding new ways to kill them. The report also notes that one in four germ …
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One might expect to hear urgent care’s praises sung by insurers, public health experts, and certainly patients, but props from a website devoted to offering investment insights might be unexpected. And yet, if you go to TheStreet you’ll find an article boldly titled Why Going to Urgent Care Is Better than the ER. As you read the article, it becomes apparent why the site is on the urgent care bandwagon. Cost savings for healthcare consumers …
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You may have already assumed this based on repeat visits by “frequent flyers” in your practice, but a recent study published in PLOS One confirms that without prompts, the majority of patients forget at least part of what they’re told by physicians. One culprit revealed by the study: limited time for provider–patients engagements. Patients surveyed remembered only 49% of their doctor’s instructions on their own; 36% did better with prompts, and 15% either could not …
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