Journal of Urgent Care Medicine

How Off-Duty Statements Create On-Duty Liability

Urgent Message: There is effectively no right to “free speech” in a private employer-employee relationship. That means private healthcare employers have the authority to terminate staff whose off-duty statements violate professional ethics or harm the organization’s reputation. Alan A. Ayers, MBA, MAcc Keywords: free speech; social media; healthcare liability; malpractice risk; first amendment; employment law; ethical standards; risk management In today’s polarized political climate, the line between private citizen and public professional hasn’t vanished, but …

The Risks of Fully AI-Driven Revenue Cycle Management

Kimberly Hardin, Josh Rainey As healthcare organizations look to modernize operations, the idea of a fully artificial intelligence (AI)-driven revenue cycle management (RCM) system is increasingly appealing in urgent care. Automating everything from coding and charge capture to claims submission and denial management promises efficiency, speed, and reduced labor costs. However, moving to a truly autonomous AI model introduces a range of risks that organizations must carefully evaluate before making the leap. Financial Exposure and …

Which Generation Uses Urgent Care The Most?

Understanding generational demographics is critical for any organization because age drives consumer behavior.¹ While the U.S. population is distributed relatively evenly across adult cohorts,² urgent care utilization—based on an analysis of 2025 Experity EMR visit data conducted by Urgent Care Consultants—skews heavily toward younger adults.³ Gen Z and Millennials combined (born 1981–2012) account for more than 51% of all urgent care visits despite representing only 43% of the U.S. population—a combined over-index of nearly 20 …

From Momentum to Action

May is a time to reflect, reset, and carry forward the momentum we’ve built over the first part of the year. Coming out of our 2026 Urgent Care Convention in Chicago, that momentum feels real and shared by all Urgent Care stakeholders. Over the past several months, we’ve talked about advocacy, about proving our value, and about the importance of showing up for one another as an industry. The Convention brought all of that into …

At Odds: Do Clinical Practice Metrics Incentivize Bad Medicine?

Justin R. Murphy, MMSc, PA-C We live in a world that revolves around data. If you have been in the medical field for a decade or longer, you have observed the trend toward increasingly data-driven medical practice. If you have been practicing more recently, you have lived it. Metrics continually shape our practice patterns and influence our care, and their utilization will only increase. Currently, analytics and artificial intelligence tools cannot directly process human cognition …

Twenty Years of Progress and a Future We Will Lead

This April issue of JUCM marks a meaningful milestone: 20 years of publication serving the Urgent Care community. It’s fitting that this edition will be in-hand at the 2026 Urgent Care Convention in Chicago, surrounded by many of the individuals who have helped shape this industry over the past 2 decades. Anniversaries provide an opportunity for reflection. They inspire us to look back with perspective and to look forward with intention. My own journey in …

A Basic Guide to Coding Denials and Diagnosis Compliance

Samantha Etter, CPC; Reanna Nelson, CPC Healthcare reimbursement processes continue to evolve. In 2026, diagnosis-based denials have increased significantly across multiple payer types. Unlike procedural denials, diagnosis denials often stem from policy interpretation rather than incorrect coding. For urgent care, each denial impacts revenue cycle performance, increases administrative burden, delays reimbursement, and raises compliance concerns. Understanding the root causes behind diagnosis denials is essential for proactive prevention and long-term revenue integrity. Historically, diagnosis denials were …

Portable X-Ray in Urgent Care: Why Cheaper Isn’t Better

Urgent Message: Urgent care startups should avoid “cheaper” portable x-ray units, as they face regulatory restrictions, create workflow bottlenecks, and produce inferior images, making a fixed DR suite a better long-term investment. Keywords: portable x-ray; diagnostic radiology; radiation exposure; fractures Urgent care centers thrive by delivering fast, comprehensive, 1-stop service to ambulatory patients, and imaging capability is central to that promise. New operators commonly face a dilemma: their pro forma is tight, build-out costs are …

The ‘Test and Treat’ Shift: 2026

“Test and treat” legislation at the state level is transforming pharmacists from dispensers into providers, authorizing them to diagnose and prescribe for conditions like flu, strep, and COVID-19 without physician oversight. As the map illustrates, this model is now active in more than 20 “direct open market” states (green), with legislation pending in key “battleground” states (yellow). JUCM first reported this disruption in 2015, and now the strategic intent is finally meeting regulatory reality.1 As …

The ‘Halo Effect’ of Hybrid Care

Contrary to the fear that virtual care cannibalizes brick-and-mortar volume, 2025 data reveals a distinct “halo effect” for hybrid urgent care operators. Analysis of average daily visits shows that practices offering telemedicine outperformed those that did not by nearly 12%, averaging 34.5 visits per day compared to 30.8. Crucially, this growth is not purely digital. While hybrid clinics averaged 2.1 telemedicine cases daily, they also saw 32.4 in-person visits—approximately 2 more physical encounters per day …

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