• E-mail
• Print
• Comment
• Font Size
• Digg
• del.icio.us
• Discuss article

A Healthy Approach to Grocery Shopping? Alegent is Opening a Mini-Clinic in the Hy-Vee Store at 156th Street and West Maple Road.

Posted on: Tuesday, 10 January 2006, 18:00 CST

By Nichole Aksamit

A gallon of milk, a loaf of bread -- and a throat culture?

Indeed.

Alegent Health is opening what appears to be the Omaha area's only seven-day-a-week mini-clinic within a grocery store. The Quick Care clinic opens today in the Hy-Vee store at 156th Street and West Maple Road.

With a single exam room and a physician assistant, the clinic offers walk-up, pay-at-thecounter health screenings, vaccinations and consultations for minor ailments -- the sort that might require a throat swab and a prescription but not an X-ray or a major procedure.

A growing number of such clinics have cropped up in Wal-Marts, Targets and chain pharmacies in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Maryland in the past two years.

Alegent plans a second Quick Care at the Hy-Vee at 180th and Q Streets this quarter and several more this year.

While he worries about the quality and continuity of care for patients who frequent such clinics, the president of the Metro Omaha Medical Society said the mini-clinic trend serves as a wake-up call to him and other primary-care physicians.

"We could be doing a better job of opening our schedules so patients can be seen in traditional doctor's offices and not have to rely on grocery stores for health care," said Dr. David Filipi.

Alegent spokeswoman Dina Maas said the Quick Care concept works simply: Patients sign in at a counter near the pharmacy and can either take a seat or grab a pager and shop until it beeps.

When called, patients meet briefly with one of the clinic's two physician assistants, Kimberly Dierks or Josalynn Swan. They pay with cash, checks or credit cards. If they want to submit the visit to insurance for possible coverage, they must do so on their own.

Maas said the clinic isn't equipped to handle emergency cases or children younger than 18 months. And it isn't intended to replace routine visits to a primary care doctor.

But it does offer screenings for diabetes, high blood pressure and pregnancy; vaccines; diagnoses and prescriptions for allergies, coughs, colds, bronchitis, influenza and many infections; and referrals if people show up with conditions that are more severe.

Prices range from $25 to $53. Clinic hours are 9 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on weekends and holidays.

Maas said the physician assistants work with supervising but mostly off-site doctors. She said those physicians, Drs. David Hoeft and Paula Walters, review all patient charts and observe the assistants in action at least once a week.

Nebraska Health and Human Services System regulations require physicians to be working at the same site as their assistants at least 20 percent of the time.

Cheryl Lindly, a physician assistant with Alegent Health who helped develop the Quick Care concept, said that typically occurs at the physician's main clinic. Alegent is so confident in its Quick Care staff, she said, that it is seeking an exception to the 20 percent rule.

Neither Methodist Health System nor Creighton University Medical Center report plans to jump on the mini-clinic bandwagon. No one at the Nebraska Medical Center was available to discuss the concept Monday.

Filipi, who also serves as vice president of medical affairs for Physicians Clinic, worries that the mini-clinic trend may fragment patient records and relationships with primary care doctors.

He said he also worries that medical decisions could be made more sloppily in a setting that lacks the on-site supervision and supporting diagnostic equipment that a full clinic or hospital might have.

"The patient will say, 'Do I really have to get that test elsewhere?' And you begin saying 'Well, maybe we can make a guess at what you have here,'" he said.

Lindly said Quick Care assistants will fax records to patients' primary care doctors on request.

They also will advise patients to see their usual doctors for follow-up care, particularly if clinic records show recurring problems, such as persistent ear or sinus infections. And they will refer patients for testing and treatment of more severe medical problems.

"(The Quick Care) is not all things to all people," Lindly said. "We're trying to fill a niche."

Source: Omaha World - Herald

More News in this Category