Americans young and old will sometimes get ill or hurt, and whenever this happens, a nearby responsible adult may use the Internet to find a local urgent care center or walk in clinic, if they don’t already know one. More serious cases may call for 24 hour emergency care, such as in a hospital’s emergency care room. Children under the age of 18 may be taken to an urgent care center for kids, and there, pediatricians on staff will know how to treat patients such as babies, toddlers, and grade-school children. An urgent care center for kids may be found with a specific Internet search, and the seeker may specify that they need a 24 hour urgent care center for kids if they are searching at an odd time of day. For adults, meanwhile, problems such as chest pain or difficulty breathing may send them to emergency care. Different levels of car exist for any patient, and some clinics are in fact hybrid models.
An Urgent Care Center for Kids
Pediatrics is the field of medicine for children, with “child” being anyone from a newborn to a 17-year-old. Pediatricians are doctors who are specialized in the treatment and diagnosis of children, and they are familiar with the anatomy of children and common ailments that they suffer from. Some pediatricians are private doctors that may be visited regularly by appointment, and a child may undergo some checkups. But for medical cases outside of an appointment, an urgent care center for kids is the right choice. Parents may look up such clinics ahead of time for reference in case their child becomes ill or hurt, and make sure that they know at least one 24 hour urgent care center for kids.
At such a clinic, a child may be treated for similar problems that an adult may suffer. In this case in particular, pediatricians rather than conventional doctors and nurses can take care of a young patient. A patient may get medicinal relief from the common cold or flu during influenza season, and a child patient may also get medicine for an ear infection. If a child has suffered from a bad rash, an allergic reaction, or sunburn, that youngster may get lotion and ointment applied on the affected skin, to soothe irritation and scale back the symptoms. Children may also suffer wrist or ankle sprains during sports or other physical play, and if this happens, a pediatrician may help reduce the swelling and offer an ankle or wrist brace during recovery. A child may even have bone fractures taken care of at such a clinic.
Adult Urgent and Emergency Care
Meanwhile, any patient aged 18 and over may visit a conventional urgent care clinic or emergency clinic or ER, depending on the severity of their medical case. These are not the same thing, however. Emergency care is for patients who have suffered serious and life-threatening injuries or conditions, and they need the care that doctors, physicians, and surgeons can offer.
What calls for emergency care? A patient may have suffered broken arms or legs, for example, or they may have broken ribs that have punctured internal organs, such as the lungs. A patient may have suffered a head or eye injury, and stab and bullet wounds certainly merit a visit to emergency care. Conditions such as serious chest pain or difficulty breathing may soon turn life threatening, and call for emergency care as well. It may be noted, though, that not all medical cases call for this level of care. Victims of minor medical cases may visit urgent care centers instead, and those walk in clinic are typically faster and cheaper to visit anyway.
An adult patient may visit any number of urgent care centers nearby, many of which may be built into strip malls, or even built into a retailer or hospital. Most such clinics offer a pharmacy, where patients may pick up prescription drug refills. Retail clinics in particular may have pharmacies, for the convenience of shoppers who need prescription drug refills. Patients may get treatment for skin conditions, sprained joints, bone fractures, or shallow cuts (where they will get stitches and bandages). Upper respiratory issues are another common reason to visit these urgent care centers.