Urgent Care facilities and Emergency Rooms both prioritize the speed of medical service that they provide to patients. They can both be subject to long waits and long lines, depending on the circumstance. However, urgent care tends to be faster than the emergency room. But why is this the case? Let’s take a look at some of the key reasons why urgent care facilities can typically care for their patients faster than an emergency room.
Shorter Wait Times
One key way that urgent care facilities are typically faster than emergency rooms is their shorter waiting time for patients. Because of the nature of the injuries and medical situations that merit a visit to an urgent care facility, treatment and care is typically less time-consuming than that of treatment and care at an emergency room.
Most injuries and medical situations that bring a patient to an urgent care consist of common illnesses and minor injuries such as cuts, scrapes, severe bruising, joint sprains and more similar injuries. These don’t usually take as much time to treat as the injuries that are seen in emergency rooms, so traffic moves faster at urgent care, which keeps wait times down and helps patients get in and out, receiving the intentional care that they need without taking as much of their time.
Patients at emergency rooms sometimes have to wait longer to receive the intentional medical care that they need because they and the patients in front of them require more intensive care that takes longer, meaning that wait times increase. Oftentimes emergency rooms can see rapid swells in patients, which takes up all of the capacity they have to care well for their patients. It is also common for emergency rooms to have limited staff at certain hours, which also naturally makes wait times longer.
Walk-In Appointments
Another factor that makes urgent care facilities so fast is that they typically offer walk-in appointments. Patients can simply arrive at the urgent care, walk in and schedule their appointment for the next available time, which could be as soon as in a matter of minutes! This convenient attribute of urgent care facilities helps keep wait times down.
Most urgent care facilities will also typically have a way to schedule appointments online from your phone or computer, which makes the process seamless and quick. When signing up for an appointment online isn’t an option for a patient because of scheduling or a lack of access, or just because time necessitates it, walk-in appointments are incredibly convenient and helpful.
Short Waits and Walk-In Appointments with Mills Urgent Care
Auburn & Opelika area patients who are in need of medical attention from an urgent care for injuries such as bruises, joint sprains, cuts, scrapes, minor burns, common illness & more can turn to the trusted professionals at the nearest Mills Urgent Care location. With a priority on serving patients with reliable, quality care, Mills Urgent Care is here to serve patients in the area who need medical assistance.
Schedule an appointment online today, or visit one of our Auburn & Opelika, Alabama locations today for a walk-in appointment! We look forward to serving you and getting you the medical care that you need as quickly as possible. To further contact Mills Urgent Care, click here. Come see us at a Mills Urgent Care location the next time you need the services of an urgent care facility.
