the Cost of Urgent Care Clinics

This charge was basically just to see the doctor. He did the basic checkup things, wrote a prescription, and said to check back with our family doctor if my husband wasn't feeling better in a few days.

I was not impressed with this service at all. First, we sat in the waiting room for an hour and a half. My husband finally got into an examination room to see a doctor, and had to wait another half an hour for the doctor to come in. This would not be a pleasant experience for anyone, but when you are feeling very poorly, it's even less so. The nurse took his temperature and blood pressure. Blood pressure was normal, temperature was about 103. When the doctor finally came in, he asked my husband a few questions, listened to his heart and lungs, looked as his throat, then wrote him a prescription for cough medicine and told him to take ibuprofen.

Thirty six hours later we had my husband back in urgent care with a fever of over 105 degrees. Again, we had to wait for over an hour, and he spent another hour and a half seeing the doctor and having various tests, including blood work and a chest x-ray. This ended up costing $1200, and they found he had pneumonia. Too bad the doctor the first night didn't bother to check. Could have saved a lot of pain and suffering and over $300!!

If possible, see your family doctor rather than go to the urgent care clinic. Some of the doctors are good, some not so good, and you can't choose or know who will be working ahead of time. Also, the base charge itself is much less expensive for a regular office call than it is for the same services at urgent care.