In the past couple of decades, the number of people needing emergency room services has sky rocketed. As a way to combat the over crowding of emergency care centers in the United States, urgent care centers have been sprouting up all across the country in the past few decades. After hours urgent care centers are a fairly new addition to the healthcare industry. They have been built to pick up slack for the thousands of doctors offices and emergency rooms in the United States that are overwhelmed with the volume of patients. Before you decide to visit a urgent care center near you, here are a few important facts you need to know.
One of the main reasons that people turn to a urgent care center for treatment is when their normal doctor’s office is closed. Most urgent care centers have extended hours, and some are even open 24 hours, so a more minor emergency can be taken care of without the need to visit an emergency room. Most urgent care centers specialize in treating minor emergencies like smaller broken bones, respiratory illnesses, asthma attacks, food poisoning, and flu symptoms. They are usually able to help people with these issues faster and cheaper than the average emergency room as well. In fact, an estimated 35 percent of emergency room visits in the United States could have been resolved faster, and more affordably at an urgent care center.
The Urgent Care Association of America has recently reported that over 80 percent of urgent care patients wait 15 minutes or less for treatment. The average emergency room in the united states can not even come close to this number. One of the reasons for this is that urgent care centers do not care for extreme emergencies. Not having to worry about the bigger life threatening issues in the middle of helping kids with the flu makes the whole system able to run more smoothly.
The average urgent care center is also able to offer medical treatment at a significantly lower cost. This is great for those who are under insured or have no insurance at all. It offers an alternative that was not available just a few years ago. This is also one of the reasons that an estimated 15 percent of urgent care facilities throughout the United States are found in urban areas.
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