Journal of Urgent Care Medicine

Implications of HIPAA and Employee Confidentiality Rules on Positive Drug Test Results

Urgent message: In addition to drug testing their own employees, many urgent care centers offer drug testing as a service to other employers. Therefore, it’s important to understand the laws affecting the privacy of drug screen results. Alan A. Ayers, MBA, MAcc is Vice President of Strategic Initiatives for Practice Velocity, LLC and is Practice Management Editor of The Journal of Urgent Care Medicine Introduction It’s standard procedure throughout the country for employers to require …

2018 Current Procedural Terminology (CPT) Code Changes

There are 314 code changes in the CPT manual for 2018, with 172 new codes, 60 revised codes, and 82 deleted codes. Most of the changes affect surgery procedures, but the updates include several changes that are relevant to urgent care. For your convenience, we have listed these changes in expected relevance to urgent care: Radiology Codes for x-rays of the chest and abdomen have been deleted and replaced with codes based on the number …

Nurse-Only Visits in Urgent Care: An Analysis of Outcomes and Patient Satisfaction Relative to Traditional Care

Urgent message: As shown in an in-house study by one urgent care operator, protocol-driven, nurse-only care of specific presenting complaints may be one way to help curb healthcare spending while not compromising on quality of care or threatening patient-satisfaction scores. Kyle Coon and Brett Whyte, MD Abstract Basic healthcare costs are rising at a staggering and, it’s widely considered, unsustainable rate. As a result, lower-cost alternatives that maintain quality and satisfaction are being explored across …

A Snapshot of Pediatric Urgent Care Operations

In October, we offered a glimpse at the operating hours of pediatric urgent care centers around the country. We also promised to share more on that growing segment of the urgent care marketplace—and this month we’re following through on that. The data below are drawn from a sample of 35 U.S. pediatric urgent care centers, and are part of a larger pool that we expect to be the subject of an expansive article in a …

Urgent Care 2.0: Health Systems Taking the Retail Approach to the Next Level

Urgent message: Spurred by disruptive market entrants and burgeoning consumerism, health systems are increasingly adopting retail principles to better meet consumers’ shifting expectations. Thus, urgent care stakeholders, either as standalone operators or partners with a hospital/health system, must further expand upon their retail offerings in order to fend off increased competition. Alan A. Ayers, MBA, MAcc is Vice President of Strategic Initiatives for Practice Velocity, LLC and is Practice Management Editor of The Journal of …

How Patients Find a Healthcare Professional

Every business—universally, in every field—survives on its ability to draw the right customers. For healthcare professionals, that means patients. In this age of on-demand service and walk-in appointments, more than at any other time, providers are also called upon to be astute marketers who know how to help patients find them when they need care. Making the effort doesn’t always assure success, however. So, it may be helpful to know that there are new, independent …

Understanding Case-Rate Reimbursement

Q: What is case-rate reimbursement, and how does it work in the urgent care sector? A: Case rate, sometimes called flat rate, describes a reimbursement structure in which providers receive a flat reimbursement rate for every patient visit, no matter what service they provide. Case-rate reimbursement means that the urgent care is contracted with the payor to receive the same reimbursement regardless of the acuity of care, whether it’s the treatment of a hangnail or …

What HIPAA Is and What It’s Not

Urgent message: While many people perceive HIPAA as a law governing patient privacy, protection and standards for personal health information is only one aspect of this law, which was originally intended to regulate health insurance. Alan A. Ayers, MBA, MAcc is Vice President of Strategic Initiatives for Practice Velocity, LLC and is Practice Management Editor of The Journal of Urgent Care Medicine. Introduction Ask anyone—even the owner of an urgent care center—what HIPAA is, …

How Urgent Care Cultivates Competition in Healthcare

Urgent message: U.S. healthcare has been a monolith of inefficiency, limited access, and untenable costs for decades, due mainly to a lack of healthy competition. Today’s healthcare landscape, however, spurred by converging market forces, is rapidly evolving into a competitive marketplace, with urgent care being one of the key catalysts for this welcomed and long overdue change. Alan A. Ayers, MBA, MAcc is Vice President of Strategic Initiatives for Practice Velocity, LLC and is Practice …

Hard Data on Why Patients Keep Flocking to Urgent Care Centers

Urgent care insiders know our industry continues to grow and evolve, and understand that convenience, cost, and quality of care are what keeps patients coming back. Data from outside the industry diving a bit deeper into the “why” of patient volume has been a bit scarce, however. A Harris Poll commissioned by Mercy Health System of Southeastern Pennsylvania takes a step toward remedying that shortage, however. Not surprisingly, a strong majority (66%) of the 1,700 …

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