Medical emergencies are part and parcel of everyone’s life and to handle them right in time setups of urgent care services may be found almost in all areas these days. Urgent care service centers are nowadays operating almost everywhere and have proven benefits for the patients too.
The best thing about most of urgent care centers is that they offer 24 hour urgent care to their patients. Basically, it is a mini clinic where you can always head to for the basic medication of mild medical problems. However, when you have life threatening emergencies urgent care may not be a suitable place to go.
Reasons to Opt for Urgent Care Services (i)
The popularity of urgent care services is increasing day by day and a lot of people are taking the best advantages out of these services, a few reason which may compel people to choose the fast urgent care service centers may comprise of the following.
Convenient and Quick Solution
Visiting hospitals for minor problems is always a very inconvenient choice, the first problem is that hospital might not be close to you but you can always find an urgent care near you. On the other hand, the time required to wait for your turn at the hospital is pretty longer because there are many patients already in the queue, moreover emergency cases are given priority and doctor may leave the usual patients in case of emergency. So, you never know how many hours you might need to wait for your turn.
Affordable Treatment
Hospitals are known for sending out shocking bills to their patients whereas with the urgent care centers this is not the case. You can always be at peace that they will provide you with a very reasonable form of service which would be very normal and affordable for everyone coming over for their treatments.
Covers Most Treatments
The urgent care service centers nowadays have been made as equipped at possible, though they are never good for life threatening disease because lack of expertise and medical setup but still in terms of the usual medical issues these days they have progressed really well. Many urgent care centers now have a proper laboratory in place for the usual tests, they have x-rays and CT scans available and with this physiotherapy and pharmacies are even covered by these. The blends of these services in every area represent much ease to the people living there and even in the middle of night they can rush to these for minor issues.
Downside of Urgent Care Centers
Although the ease offered by urgent care centers is commendable by all means, there are many downsides as well and must be kept an eye on.
Delayed Hospital Visit
It is very obvious that a patient won’t know what’s wrong with him and whether it is actually an emergency situation or not and when they have such an urgent care clinic around that can end up wasting their time by going there. Many patients face this situation where they go to these centers for treatment and upon reaching are informed that their cases is critical and can be sorted at a big hospital. This ends up wasting their time and the visit to hospital is delayed for no good reason.
Lack of Record Maintained
An urgent care clinic won’t have your records; they don’t have that extensive record management system working at the backend like they do in the hospital. So, every time you go there you are a new patient to them and you have to carry your records on your own.
New Person on Every Visit
The duty of the staff and doctors at urgent care centers tend to change all the time and you won’t come across the same people every time you go there. So, you won’t have that level of comfort with everyone, whereas at the hospital you are visiting to a particular doctor by taking an appointment so you will have the same person there with whom you may have a comfort level already.
Lack of Insurance Coverage
Insurance is covered by almost all the hospitals you go, but keeping in mind the standard of the urgent care clinics and the scale of their revenue many urgent care centers do not support your insurance claims so for people who rely on insurance for the slightest medical implication might not find urgent care services suitable for them.
Compromised Standard
You can never compare an urgent care centre with a huge hospital, the standard is always compromised and that’s not even the mistake on their part. They are charging low and obviously they never say that they will offer the same level of expertise as hospitals do. So, you must need to keep this thing in mind that the person treating you at urgent care center may not be a specialist, he could be a new doctor, he could be someone who has gained his experience through clinics only and he could be a resident doctor too.
Quick Tips for Selecting Urgent Care Services (ii)
There are many options around you in terms of urgent care services but which one suit you is something only you could decide so consider he below suggested tips and make your selection.
- Know the location how close or how far an urgent care service centre is so that you can always decide when to rush and how long will it take to reach.
- Which time is suitable to visit that particular urgent care centre near you, there are some hours which are crowded and some which are calm so choose the calm time slot.
- Some urgent care centers accept insurance but most of them don’t so analyze this facility beforehand so that you aren’t disappointed later.
- Make sure to check with the level of cleanliness and hygiene in the urgent care center you will be visiting because infections are very common at such places.
Deciding whether to choose a hospital or an urgent care clinic depends upon the medical condition so you must stay aware of what kinds of medical issues could be suitable for taking to the urgent care so that your time and health is not wasted.
- https://patientengagementhit.com/news/what-are-the-pros-and-cons-of-retail-urgent-care-clinics
- https://www.solvhealth.com/faq/how-to-choose-an-urgent-care-clinic