Practice

Burnout is an ongoing problem in urgent care and other practice environments. It’s been exacerbated since the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic. We know this already. But JAMA Network Open just published new data that shed light on the biggest culprits, which in turn could give you a leg up on helping your providers maintain a healthy perspective and peak productivity. According to the article, based on a cross-sectional study of 1,310 clinicians, gender and …

As with testing supplies early on in the pandemic, most urgent care operators have had a hard time getting their hands on enough doses of COVID-19 vaccine to really make a difference in their communities. That could be changing in the near future, however, as multiple states are reporting that the demand for COVID-19 vaccines is waning—leaving them with the unexpected challenge of ensuring that their supply is put to good use while it’s viable. …

This year marks a milestone for Millennials, as the oldest members of that generation (defined by Pew Research as anyone born between 1981 and 1996) turn 40-years-old. According to a CNBC report drawn from a Harris Poll, 44% of them already have at least one chronic health condition. While some are clearly beyond the scope of urgent care (eg, neurodevelopmental disorders and multiple sclerosis), others include high cholesterol, hypertension, migraine headaches, and other conditions for …

There’s no doubt that the ability to offer patients immunization against a deadly virus would be a good thing for urgent care. Patients who have never visited your facility before may be encouraged to step inside for the first time, thereby getting a close-up view of how professional your team is and leaving with a peace of mind they may have been lacking for months. What offering the vaccine will not do is provide even …

As mass market retailers like Walmart and CVS push sales of over-the-counter COVID-19 tests, urgent care operators may have concerns that patients will no longer seek answers from their local urgent care center. Undoubtedly some patients who want to know if they have COVID-19 for personal reasons, such as if they want to visit an elderly relative, will head down to the drugstore for their test, many more require documentation from a healthcare provider for …

Vaccines are getting all the headlines these days, but the reality is that COVID-19 testing will continue to be essential to helping the United States recover from the effects of the pandemic for a long time. That means opportunities for urgent care to play an essential role in reducing spread and ensuring early treatment abound. Most recently, the Department of Health and Human Services announced a $12 billion program to expand testing at the community …

People are sick of wearing masks, wiping down their grocery carts, and sanitizing their hands every time they even think of touching a doorknob—so much so that there’s widespread rebellion against what we’ve come to view as basic hygiene practices in the time of COVID-19. We see evidence of this on the nightly news and social media throughout the day. What if we eased the “rules” a little, though—not because we’re bowing to people’s impatience …

While various states are easing restrictions devised to help curb the spread of COVID-19, Texas has taken the most dramatic step by dropping its mask mandate altogether. This coincides with new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, published in MMWR, indicating that requiring people to wear masks in public places like retail establishments and restaurants helped reduce both the incidence of infection and deaths attributed to the virus. Between March 1 and …

Whether it’s sensible or not, given that it would be generous to call distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine “clunky” up to this point, some large scale testing sites and public health centers are starting to shift their emphasis to immunization. In Florida, for example, the testing site located in a football stadium relocated to a much smaller mall space—with a vaccination operation moving from that mall to the stadium. So where are all the people …

It’s expected that patients are not at their best when they enter an urgent care center. Clearly they’re not feeling well in one way or another. That’s probably compounded by the fact that they couldn’t get in to see their “regular” doctor—and the overall stresses of having to be around other sick people in the midst of a deadly pandemic. Tempers may be short. You and your team can’t afford to respond in a like …