Illnesses and injuries crop up ? usually right after your clinic closes or on the weekend.
From babies to adults, urgent care treats most of the same needs as your regular clinic.
Listen in as Susan Scanlon, MD gives great advice about when to use urgent care, the range of care and what to expect at Allina Health Urgent Care.
How to Make Smart Use of Urgent Care
Featured Speaker:
Learn more about Dr. Scanlon
Susan Scanlon, MD – Emergency Medicine
As a board-certified emergency medicine doctor, Dr. Scanlon immediately gains your trust when you see her for your urgent care need. She’s practiced care in urgent care settings for seven years. And, as a mom, she readily relates to emotional needs of parents and kids when there’s an accident or injury. In her free time, Dr. Scanlon enjoys spending time with her daughter and dog, hiking or gardening and attending live music events.Learn more about Dr. Scanlon
Transcription:
How to Make Smart Use of Urgent Care
Melanie Cole (Host): Illnesses and injuries crop up and usually right after your clinic closes or on the weekend. From babies to adults, urgent care treats most of the same needs as your regular clinic. My guest today is Dr. Susan Scanlon. She’s a board certified emergency medicine doctor with Allina Health. Welcome to the show, Dr. Scanlon. When should a person decide, how do they decide to use urgent care?
Dr. Susan Scanlon (Guest): Well, urgent care will be a really good safety net for people, like you mentioned, because these things seem to happen, illnesses crop up when your clinic is closed. Use urgent care in those situations and also when you can’t get a same-day appointment with your regular healthcare provider. Urgent care is open to patients of all ages. We see everyone from infants through older adults and we’re also open both for Allina Health patients and for patients who have never been to the Allina System before. You can come to urgent care and we’ll be happy to see you there. Urgent care is for times when you feel like you have something going on that needs prompt evaluation but it’s not an emergency. You should come to urgent care if you don’t feel comfortable waiting for a clinic appointment, if you’re concerned because you’re having symptoms that you’ve never experienced before and you would like to get those checked out, or if you have something that actually physically needs to be seen in order to be evaluated. Those things would be injuries, some rashes, things like that. Allina also has something called e-Visits and those are available for Allina Health patients through MyChart. Those will be for things that you have a pretty good idea of what’s going on, like a bladder infection or if you think you might have pink eyes, something like that. That’s my best advice for when someone should decide to use urgent care.
Melanie: What’s the range of care that someone receives at urgent care? What can you really do for them there?
Dr. Scanlon: Well, urgent care is a really good option for minor illnesses and injuries. Examples of that would be sprains or possible broken bones. We can do care for things like abrasions or cuts that may need stitches. We routinely see patients for things like sore throats and earaches, bad colds, flu symptoms, bladder infection symptoms. We also see children. If you’re concerned that your child has a fever and they might have strep throat or ear infection, or you’re concerned about how serious a cold or a cough is, we can check that out. We can also do things like assess red and irritated eyes or eye injuries like scratches to the cornea. Urgent care is a good location to come in if you have a headache, if you have joint pain, if you’ve got a new rash. All of our sites are able to do labs and x-rays on site, so that’s a nice tool that we have available when we’re evaluating what’s going on with you. I would like to make a really important point, though, which is that if you or your family member is experiencing something like uncontrolled bleeding, if anybody is having chest pain or chest pressure, someone’s feeling really short of breath, or if you’re concerned about stroke symptoms, those are the times to call 911 or go to emergency department because that is really beyond what we can assess in urgent care and treat appropriately.
Melanie: Are the providers in urgent care specially trained for acute care situations?
Dr. Scanlon: Well, all of our doctors in urgent care are board certified in their specialty. Most of our doctors are either family medicine physicians or emergency medicine physicians. So, yes, everybody is experienced in dealing with acute care situations. We always have a doctor available on site. We also staff our urgent care using nurse practitioners and physician assistants as well. So when you come to urgent care, regardless of what your complaint is, you can be sure that you’re going to get a thorough exam for whatever condition you have.
Melanie: For Allina patients, Dr. Scanlon, does the provider have access to medical records? And what if you’re not an Allina patient?
Dr. Scanlon: Okay, that’s a good question. All the urgent care staff and providers have access to the Allina Health electronic medical record, the EMR. In some cases, if you are not an Allina Health patient, we might be able to get records from other systems in the area through something called Care Everywhere, although that’s not true of all clinics outside of Allina. We do see patients who aren’t Allina Health patients, but my advice in those situations would be if you are on any medications or you have any allergies, to bring the list with you. For new patients, that’s really helpful information when it comes time to writing prescriptions, to make sure that there aren’t drug interactions or we’re not getting into problems with allergies that you had in the past.
Melanie: Dr. Scanlon, what about infants? Are the providers at urgent care trained to deal with young children or do you wait for your pediatrician or go to the ER?
Dr. Scanlon: No. Urgent care is definitely a good place to bring infants and children. All of our providers are prepared to see kids of all ages. They feel comfortable doing that. The examples of things that we commonly treat in young children would be ear infections, cold, cough, fevers, and minor injuries. My advice about when to bring your baby to urgent care instead of waiting would be to bring them in if you’re concerned, if you are concerned that your baby isn’t acting as normally, if you’re concerned about the fever, if your baby seems uncomfortable. We are here to help. Bring them in, we will check out your kiddo and give you some peace of mind. If there’s something going on, we will assess it, we’ll get it treated, and you’ll feel better about that.
Melanie: What about follow-up care? After you go to urgent care for something, whether it’s pink eye, ear infection, or something else, do you receive your follow-up care from the urgent care clinic or do you go to your regular doctor then?
Dr. Scanlon: We like to treat patients in urgent care for their acute problem and then our goal is to get you back to your primary care provider for any further care that needs to happen. A lot of times, if you need follow-up, we can actually help get those appointments arranged before you even leave the clinic so you know when you’re going in for your follow-up appointment. If there’s something where you don’t exactly need follow-up, but you might, we can give clear instructions and criteria for when to follow up, and for people who have something that requires specialty follow-up, like an orthopedic injury or maybe something going on with your ears, we can make referrals for specialists, so we can refer patients to the orthopedist, we can refer patients to the eye clinic if you need follow-up for an eye injury or an eye irritation or if you need a referral for ear, nose, and throat. We can help make all of those things happen in urgent care.
Melanie: What about insurance? Does insurance cover a visit to urgent care?
Dr. Scanlon: Most insurances are going to cover urgent care visits, but it’s important to know that depending on what kind of health plan you have, you might have a slightly higher copay for an urgent care visit versus a primary care clinic visit. Also keep in mind, urgent care is almost always less expensive than using an emergency room for minor illnesses and injuries.
Melanie: Dr. Scanlon, in just the last minute or two, what’s your best advice about the smart use of urgent care for patients?
Dr. Scanlon: My advice would be to use your best judgment. If you or one of your family members is experiencing something that you think might be life-threatening or severe, you need to go to an emergency department. If it’s not an emergency, but you feel like it needs to be evaluated promptly and something that can’t wait, then Allina Health Urgent Care is a great option. If you end up coming to urgent care, but you actually need to be cared for in an emergency department, we can help make arrangements to get you to the location that you need to be in to be safe and be cared for. I was also going to add if you want more information about what we can see in urgent care, about our locations, about our hours, that information is all available online at allinahealth.org/urgentcare, so a lot more resources there.
Melanie: Thank you so much. You’re listening to the WELLcast by Allina Health. For more information about urgent care, you can go to allinahealth.org. That’s allinahealth.org. This is Melanie Cole. Thanks so much for listening and have a great day.
How to Make Smart Use of Urgent Care
Melanie Cole (Host): Illnesses and injuries crop up and usually right after your clinic closes or on the weekend. From babies to adults, urgent care treats most of the same needs as your regular clinic. My guest today is Dr. Susan Scanlon. She’s a board certified emergency medicine doctor with Allina Health. Welcome to the show, Dr. Scanlon. When should a person decide, how do they decide to use urgent care?
Dr. Susan Scanlon (Guest): Well, urgent care will be a really good safety net for people, like you mentioned, because these things seem to happen, illnesses crop up when your clinic is closed. Use urgent care in those situations and also when you can’t get a same-day appointment with your regular healthcare provider. Urgent care is open to patients of all ages. We see everyone from infants through older adults and we’re also open both for Allina Health patients and for patients who have never been to the Allina System before. You can come to urgent care and we’ll be happy to see you there. Urgent care is for times when you feel like you have something going on that needs prompt evaluation but it’s not an emergency. You should come to urgent care if you don’t feel comfortable waiting for a clinic appointment, if you’re concerned because you’re having symptoms that you’ve never experienced before and you would like to get those checked out, or if you have something that actually physically needs to be seen in order to be evaluated. Those things would be injuries, some rashes, things like that. Allina also has something called e-Visits and those are available for Allina Health patients through MyChart. Those will be for things that you have a pretty good idea of what’s going on, like a bladder infection or if you think you might have pink eyes, something like that. That’s my best advice for when someone should decide to use urgent care.
Melanie: What’s the range of care that someone receives at urgent care? What can you really do for them there?
Dr. Scanlon: Well, urgent care is a really good option for minor illnesses and injuries. Examples of that would be sprains or possible broken bones. We can do care for things like abrasions or cuts that may need stitches. We routinely see patients for things like sore throats and earaches, bad colds, flu symptoms, bladder infection symptoms. We also see children. If you’re concerned that your child has a fever and they might have strep throat or ear infection, or you’re concerned about how serious a cold or a cough is, we can check that out. We can also do things like assess red and irritated eyes or eye injuries like scratches to the cornea. Urgent care is a good location to come in if you have a headache, if you have joint pain, if you’ve got a new rash. All of our sites are able to do labs and x-rays on site, so that’s a nice tool that we have available when we’re evaluating what’s going on with you. I would like to make a really important point, though, which is that if you or your family member is experiencing something like uncontrolled bleeding, if anybody is having chest pain or chest pressure, someone’s feeling really short of breath, or if you’re concerned about stroke symptoms, those are the times to call 911 or go to emergency department because that is really beyond what we can assess in urgent care and treat appropriately.
Melanie: Are the providers in urgent care specially trained for acute care situations?
Dr. Scanlon: Well, all of our doctors in urgent care are board certified in their specialty. Most of our doctors are either family medicine physicians or emergency medicine physicians. So, yes, everybody is experienced in dealing with acute care situations. We always have a doctor available on site. We also staff our urgent care using nurse practitioners and physician assistants as well. So when you come to urgent care, regardless of what your complaint is, you can be sure that you’re going to get a thorough exam for whatever condition you have.
Melanie: For Allina patients, Dr. Scanlon, does the provider have access to medical records? And what if you’re not an Allina patient?
Dr. Scanlon: Okay, that’s a good question. All the urgent care staff and providers have access to the Allina Health electronic medical record, the EMR. In some cases, if you are not an Allina Health patient, we might be able to get records from other systems in the area through something called Care Everywhere, although that’s not true of all clinics outside of Allina. We do see patients who aren’t Allina Health patients, but my advice in those situations would be if you are on any medications or you have any allergies, to bring the list with you. For new patients, that’s really helpful information when it comes time to writing prescriptions, to make sure that there aren’t drug interactions or we’re not getting into problems with allergies that you had in the past.
Melanie: Dr. Scanlon, what about infants? Are the providers at urgent care trained to deal with young children or do you wait for your pediatrician or go to the ER?
Dr. Scanlon: No. Urgent care is definitely a good place to bring infants and children. All of our providers are prepared to see kids of all ages. They feel comfortable doing that. The examples of things that we commonly treat in young children would be ear infections, cold, cough, fevers, and minor injuries. My advice about when to bring your baby to urgent care instead of waiting would be to bring them in if you’re concerned, if you are concerned that your baby isn’t acting as normally, if you’re concerned about the fever, if your baby seems uncomfortable. We are here to help. Bring them in, we will check out your kiddo and give you some peace of mind. If there’s something going on, we will assess it, we’ll get it treated, and you’ll feel better about that.
Melanie: What about follow-up care? After you go to urgent care for something, whether it’s pink eye, ear infection, or something else, do you receive your follow-up care from the urgent care clinic or do you go to your regular doctor then?
Dr. Scanlon: We like to treat patients in urgent care for their acute problem and then our goal is to get you back to your primary care provider for any further care that needs to happen. A lot of times, if you need follow-up, we can actually help get those appointments arranged before you even leave the clinic so you know when you’re going in for your follow-up appointment. If there’s something where you don’t exactly need follow-up, but you might, we can give clear instructions and criteria for when to follow up, and for people who have something that requires specialty follow-up, like an orthopedic injury or maybe something going on with your ears, we can make referrals for specialists, so we can refer patients to the orthopedist, we can refer patients to the eye clinic if you need follow-up for an eye injury or an eye irritation or if you need a referral for ear, nose, and throat. We can help make all of those things happen in urgent care.
Melanie: What about insurance? Does insurance cover a visit to urgent care?
Dr. Scanlon: Most insurances are going to cover urgent care visits, but it’s important to know that depending on what kind of health plan you have, you might have a slightly higher copay for an urgent care visit versus a primary care clinic visit. Also keep in mind, urgent care is almost always less expensive than using an emergency room for minor illnesses and injuries.
Melanie: Dr. Scanlon, in just the last minute or two, what’s your best advice about the smart use of urgent care for patients?
Dr. Scanlon: My advice would be to use your best judgment. If you or one of your family members is experiencing something that you think might be life-threatening or severe, you need to go to an emergency department. If it’s not an emergency, but you feel like it needs to be evaluated promptly and something that can’t wait, then Allina Health Urgent Care is a great option. If you end up coming to urgent care, but you actually need to be cared for in an emergency department, we can help make arrangements to get you to the location that you need to be in to be safe and be cared for. I was also going to add if you want more information about what we can see in urgent care, about our locations, about our hours, that information is all available online at allinahealth.org/urgentcare, so a lot more resources there.
Melanie: Thank you so much. You’re listening to the WELLcast by Allina Health. For more information about urgent care, you can go to allinahealth.org. That’s allinahealth.org. This is Melanie Cole. Thanks so much for listening and have a great day.