My guess and it's just a guess- in a true ER you are sharing the costs of a full blown facility up to and including trauma/surgical/burn unit care, etc. So they spread the cost over all that use it.
Urgent care came along for those needing to see a Dr sooner than you can get an appt... Could be anything from a strep/flu test to stitches to anything not immediately life threatening. (lacks a lot of equipment and highly specialized Dr's.) So you aren't paying for the super expensive things you don't need.
Again, this is mostly speculation on my part.
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Return to “Stand Alone ER's / Rip Offs or ...?”
- Mon Oct 08, 2018 9:36 am
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- Topic: Stand Alone ER's / Rip Offs or ...?
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- Mon Oct 08, 2018 8:43 am
- Forum: Off-Topic
- Topic: Stand Alone ER's / Rip Offs or ...?
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Re: Stand Alone ER's / Rip Offs or ...?
Many of the stand alones are both ER and Urgent Care- be sure to know which is which and what time the Urgent care closes...
The one thing to pay special attention to is your insurance ER visit costs against "urgent care."
For us, the actual ER is a big co-pay + 20% of everything (which is nuts at an ER) plus some test/scans if needed.
VS. a stand alone- billed as "urgent care" Which for us is co-pay that's similar but no shared costs. So it's much cheaper and sufficient for all but the worst events. But our stand alone urgent care closes at 10pm. (they have an ER door that's 24hrs but then the costs go way up.)
Hope you find a good option and then I hope you never need it!!!!
- Sun Oct 07, 2018 4:11 pm
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- Topic: Stand Alone ER's / Rip Offs or ...?
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We prefer the stand alone here
Depends on the owner- many are independent Dr. owned facilities and some are chains. Our local one is owned by a group of Dr's from the area...
Short of a need for a trauma center or an active heart attack, I'll take "Premier ER/Urgent Care" over scott & white any day of the week.
We've used Premier ER/Urgent care in Temple several times... in fact we now prefer it for any non scheduled Dr. visit. The copay for urgent care is actually much less than scott & white's ER (even for the same treatments we would have had to go to the ER for) but the care seems to be much better and the waits, much much shorter. ANd no billing issues. Every time we have been to the ER we've spent months fighting the billing dept's for corrections. (billed for things we didn't get or use- x-rays not taken and meds never given) At premier, we write a single check for a copay on arrival and that's it.
Short of a need for a trauma center or an active heart attack, I'll take "Premier ER/Urgent Care" over scott & white any day of the week.
We've used Premier ER/Urgent care in Temple several times... in fact we now prefer it for any non scheduled Dr. visit. The copay for urgent care is actually much less than scott & white's ER (even for the same treatments we would have had to go to the ER for) but the care seems to be much better and the waits, much much shorter. ANd no billing issues. Every time we have been to the ER we've spent months fighting the billing dept's for corrections. (billed for things we didn't get or use- x-rays not taken and meds never given) At premier, we write a single check for a copay on arrival and that's it.