As many as 70% of patients who seek care in the emergency rooms of
Springfield Memorial Hospital or HSHS St. John’s Hospital could be served
quicker, and at less cost, by a new outpatient facility scheduled to open in
early January.
That’s the view of the future co-medical
directors of Springfield Clinic’s Urgent Care Plus, a new service at 350 W.
Carpenter St. in Springfield.
Staffed by board-certified emergency
medicine doctors, the facility will provide care beyond what is offered in
Springfield’s current urgent care offices but less than what is provided at ERs
for critically ill patients dealing with strokes, heart attacks and gunshot
wounds.
Urgent Care Plus, which initially
will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. seven days a week and holidays, will be able
to set broken bones, administer intravenous fluids and other IV medicines, as
well as care for traditional urgent care patients. It also will include an on-site
medical laboratory and scanning technology. Patients will be able to walk in or
schedule appointments online.
“I’m confident there is a need for
this in Springfield,” said Dr. DJ Goldberg, who will be co-medical director of
Urgent Care Plus with Dr. Janda Stevens.
Goldberg, 44, and Stevens, 47, are
veteran ER doctors who have been working in the St. John’s emergency
department. They will become full-time physicians with Springfield Clinic and
will staff Urgent Care Plus along with Dr. Kristen Ferguson, another
board-certified emergency medicine physician.
ERs are important to Springfield’s
acute-care hospitals, both of which are Level 1 trauma centers. More than half
of all patients admitted to the hospitals come through their ERs.
But of all the patients who seek
care at the ERs, only 30% are admitted. The rest are discharged home. It’s that
70% of patients who will be the target audience for Urgent Care Plus, Goldberg
and Stevens said.
“If you need to call an ambulance,
you’re not coming to our new facility,” Goldberg said. “We are very well able
to identify what patients are appropriate to be cared for in our facility and
which ones are too sick and definitely need to be in a hospital facility. That
literally is our job.”
Goldberg added that Urgent Care
Plus won’t be equipped to serve patients with mental illness and
behavioral-health issues.
When asked about Urgent Care Plus’
potential impact on Springfield Memorial’s 24-hour ER, hospital spokesperson
Angie Muhs declined comment.
The president and chief executive
officer of St. John’s, Matt Fry, issued a statement that didn’t mention Urgent
Care Plus and said the hospital “provides state-of-the-art emergency care to
any and all patients regardless of their medical condition.”
Promoting the new Urgent Care Plus
to potential patients who may be unfamiliar with the concept will be a
challenge, Goldberg said. The clinic is working to educate primary-care and
specialist doctors at the clinic and in the community so they can refer
patients when appropriate, he and Stevens said.
Patients who show up at Urgent
Care Plus, and who doctors determine need ER care, will be directed to a
hospital or stabilized and then transferred by ambulance to an ER at their own
expense, Goldberg said. The new site is a few blocks from Memorial and about a
mile from St. John’s.
Urgent Care Plus is part of a
nationwide trend in medicine and may be the first of its kind in central
Illinois that provides care for a broader range of patients than are typically
served in clinics that call themselves urgent care, prompt care or express
care.
For example, Urgent Care Plus will
be able to care for patients dealing with kidney stones, provide initial
stabilization for bowel obstructions, stitch up many cuts and provide IV care for
dehydration, diabetes, migraine headaches, high blood pressure and infections
such as cellulitis.
Similar facilities operate in St.
Louis and are called Total Access Urgent Care, and in Michigan as RightCare
Clinics.
Urgent Care Plus will be in a
one-story building in the Mid-Illinois Medical District that the clinic
previously used for the outpatient offices of several specialists. The clinic
is spending more than $4 million to renovate the structure, according to
Springfield building permits. The facility will cover 15,000 square feet and
include 24 exam rooms and one procedure room.
Urgent Care Plus will be part of
the clinic’s Urgent Care network and will create about 25 new jobs, said Zach
Kerker, chief brand and advocacy officer for the physician-owned, for-profit
clinic.
In addition to the three doctors,
there will be three more medical providers who are either nurse practitioners
or physician assistants. Other staff will include registered nurses, nursing
technicians and office assistants.
Urgent Care Plus will accept
private insurance, Medicare and Medicaid, and will serve uninsured patients.
Out-of-pocket charges for insured patients will be the same as what they pay
for using a traditional urgent care facility rather than an ER, Goldberg said.
IVs, scans and other procedures will be billed separately as outpatient
services.
Goldberg and Stevens said they are
confident Urgent Care Plus patients will be served faster than in a traditional
ER. That’s because of the number of exam rooms available, and because the
clinic has committed to adequately staff the facility.
Unlike in a hospital ER, rooms
won’t be clogged with patients waiting to be admitted and transferred to a bed
on a floor of a hospital, the doctors said. And they said Urgent Care Plus
isn’t being designed for critically ill patients who need ER care and are more
time-consuming to serve.
Depending on demand, hours could
be expanded for Urgent Care Plus, Goldberg said.
Springfield Clinic’s existing
network of primary-care doctors and specialists was a key factor in developing
Urgent Care Plus because the network allows seamless follow-up care, Goldberg
said. The facility also will refer to other doctors if patients have a
preference.
