Throughout the course of recent years, urgent care centers have become more widespread and popularly utilized than ever before. As a matter of fact, as many as three million people visit these urgent cares not just throughout the course of the year or month but throughout the course of just one single week. Already, there are well over 7,000 of them found throughout this one country alone, employing an ever-growing number of doctors – currently around 20,000 of them in total.
These urgent cares, after all, can serve a number of different medical needs. After all, even preventative medical care can be obtained from urgent cares throughout the entirety of the country. The flu shot is just one great example of a preventative medical treatment found in urgent care locations throughout the country. And there is no doubting the fact that getting your flu shot is a very important thing indeed.
After all, the flu is likely to common throughout the country with each and every flu season, sometimes even infecting up to around one fifth of the population (during years boasting particularly nasty strains). And the flu is a whole lot worse than the common cold. While the common cold is no danger to the average person, the flu certainly can be. Unfortunately, thousands of people end up hospitalized for the flu each and every year. Many of these people even, unfortunately, lose their lives.
But the flu shot can change this. While no flu shot is 100% effective and while there is still always the chance to contract the flu even after you’ve gotten your flu shot, some level of protection is certainly a great deal better than no protection at all. And if you get the flu after you’ve gotten your flu shot, it is likely that the flu you come down with will be considerably less severe than the flu should would have otherwise had to deal with.
And urgent cares throughout the country provide other forms of care as well. For instance, many of these urgent care centers will offer care for sunburns and other skin conditions. Sunburn, after all, can occur with shocking ease – and far more quickly than you might realize. As a matter of fact, unprotected skin can actually begin to burn in as little as 15 minutes. If this continues on for too long, the damage can become quite severe indeed. If you’re worried, being seen in a local walk in clinic can help. In addition to this, cases of poison ivy can be treated at urgent cares as well. As poison ivy is contagious to nearly the entire population and can be found in every single state that is a part of the continental United States, it is important to note the such medical knowledge is quite hugely important indeed – and will remain so for the foreseeable future as well.
In addition to this, various injuries (including many sports injuries) can be treated in urgent cares as well. Ankle sprains, after all, are quite hugely commonplace, with as many as 25,000 of them occurring throughout the course of the typical day here in the United States alone, let alone anywhere else in the world as we know it. Ultimately, sometimes more serious injuries can also be dealt with. For instance, minor fractures can be treated with ease in up to four out of every five urgent cares located in this country. This is certainly something that will save a great deal of time and money alike, at least in direct comparison to seeking emergency room care.
At the end of the day, there are many things to consider when it comes to seeking medical care. Fortunately, urgent care ticks off many of these boxes. For many people, urgent cares provide access to fast and effective, medical treatment, something that is not always able to be found in other places – and for an affordable cost as well. Fortunately, urgent care centers provide the possibility of exactly that, bringing high quality medical care to just about everyone out there.
Fortunately, urgent cares are only on the rise, with more and more of them likely to be seen in coming years.