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Emergency Rooms Vs Urgent Care Centers: How These Two Same Day Medical Services Differ
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Two medical facility types in the United States that take pride in providing quick care in the midst of a medical emergency and/or when an illness develops suddenly are emergency rooms and urgent care centers.
While both provide same-day medical services, the two facilities do differ greatly. Everyone should learn the differences between these two facilities and which to visit when suffering from a medical emergency, injury, or illness.
Read on to learn about a few key differences between emergency rooms and urgent care centers and how to know which to visit next time you become ill.
Medical Equipment and Staff: ER vs Urgent Care
The main differences between these two types of facilities are the medical equipment and medications they keep on hand and the staff members typically present at the facilities.
Equipment
A hospital emergency room is likely to have high-tech medical imaging equipment, such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and computed tomography, or CAT scan, machines available to physicians. These machines help doctors locate problems with the skeletal system, body organs, and the soft tissues of the body that can be difficult to detect with physical examination alone.
Emergency room physicians also have access to hospital pharmacies that are stocked with many medication types that can be provided directly to patients in the ER.
Urgent care centers typically lack these advanced medical imaging systems. Instead, they are typically filled with more traditional medical equipment, such as blood pressure cuffs, stethoscopes, thermometers, and x-ray machines. In addition, urgent care centers typically do not have large on-site pharmacies; instead, their physicians typically provide patients prescriptions for medications that they can then fill at local pharmacies after they leave the centers.
Medical Staff
The staff members present at emergency rooms and urgent care centers can also tend to differ greatly. A hospital emergency room will typically have at least one physician on staff at all times, along with an array of supportive medical staff members, including nurses and physician assistants.
Urgent care centers, on the other hand, may also be staffed by MDs, although some states allow these centers to be staffed solely by nurse practitioners and physicians assistants.
How to Determine Which Facility to Visit
Typically, you should visit an emergency room when you are suffering from an acute injury, illness, or medical emergency that may endanger your life . Examples of these health emergencies include chest pain that could be the sign of a heart attack, a severe head injury, intestinal bleeding, a bad cut or burn, or a severe allergic reaction.
On the other hand, a trip to an urgent care center is warranted when you are suddenly ill and cannot schedule a same-day visit with your usual physician or experience a mild injury that can likely be diagnosed without the need for high-tech medical equipment.
Now you understand how same-day medical services, including ERs and urgent care centers, differ and how to determine which one to visit when you need quick medical attention. Contact a local same-day medical service clinic near you to learn more.
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