Urgent Care vs Walk-in Clinic: What's the Difference? (2024)

Key Points

• The term "walk-in clinic" is a broad term that can refer to various healthcare providers, including urgent care centers, retail clinics, and emergency rooms, which allow patients to be seen without an appointment.
• Retail clinics are healthcare providers located within larger retail stores or pharmacies, staffed by nurse practitioners or physician assistants, and focus on minor injuries and illnesses, immunizations, and health screenings. Some are expanding to include chronic disease management.
• Urgent care centers are more advanced than retail clinics, often having at least one medical doctor on staff and equipped to handle more severe non-emergent conditions. They are often used to bridge the gap between primary care doctors and emergency rooms, offering shorter wait times and lower costs.
• Emergency rooms are open 24 hours a day and specialize in life-threatening conditions and injuries, equipped with advanced technology and highly trained medical personnel. They are required by law to accept all patients, regardless of their ability to pay, resulting in longer wait times and higher costs.
• Understanding the differences between these types of walk-in clinics can help patients choose the right healthcare provider for their needs, potentially saving time and money.

What is a Walk-in Clinic?

Weare going to take a look at the most generic of them all: walk-in clinic. Thisis also probably the easiest. A walk-in clinic is simply a healthcare providerthat allows you to come in and be seen by a healthcare provider without anappointment. This could be an urgent care, a retail clinic, even an emergencyroom. You can walk into any of them and – assuming you can pay or haveinsurance (with the exception of the emergency room) – will be seen andtreated. In fact, many primary care doctors accept walk-in patients betweentheir scheduled appointments, in which case they could also be considered awalk-in clinic.

But,for simplicity sake, we will hone in on three types of walk-in clinics: retailclinics, urgent care centers and emergency rooms and we will discuss thesethree progressively as it relates to the type and severity of healthconditions, injuries and illnesses they treat. There are, of course, otherwalk-in clinics locations like employer clinics and occupational health clinics, but wewill leave those for another day.

Retail Clinic

Firstup is a retail clinic. These healthcare providers are walk-in clinics setupinside of larger retail stores like Walmart and Target or, perhaps morecommonly, at pharmacies like Walgreens and CVS. Most of these locations aredesigned to be affordable and efficient as possible. As such, they staff nursepractitioners (NPs) or physician assistants (PAs) rather than more costlyphysicians and they tend to focus on slightly less advanced medical procedures than an urgent care center. That said,services do range based on the operator of the location.

Themost common services at retail clinics are assisting with minor injuries and illnesses like treatment of flu and cold symptoms, strep throat, and minor cuts and skin conditions. However, other common services include immunizations, annual physicals and health screenings. Some retailclinics are now expanding services to include chronic diseasemanagement. They all prescribe medications and most have adjacent pharmaciesfor pick-up convenience.

Retailclinic hours operations vary, of course, but many are open from 8:00 am to 8:00pm. Other coincide more directly with the retail store hours. It is best tocall ahead or check online for accurate patient hours and expected wait times.

Urgent Care Centers

Anurgent care center is one degree more advanced than a retail clinic and theystaff and equip accordingly. For instance, most urgent care locations have atleast one medical doctor on staff and have the physician available to seepatients any time the doors are open. That said, you could still see an nursepractitioner or physician assistant rather than a doctor. Additionally, mosturgent care locations have on-site X-Ray equipment and can handle more severeurgent care services such as broken bones, burns and other non-emergent conditionsthat retail clinics are unable to.

Urgentcare facilities are very often used to fill the gap between primary caredoctors and emergency rooms, thus alleviating the strain on ERs and theirtypically long wait times. The average patient waits 15 minutes or less at anurgent care and can expect a $35-55 insurance copy for their visit. If youdon’t have insurance, the cost may be as high as $125-150 per visit. Bothretail clinics and urgent care centers do require payment (or at least a copay)at the time of your visit.

Whilesome people have a tendency to use an urgent care as a substitute for a primarycare physician, it is not advisable given a primary care doctors insight intoyour medical records and family history. Of course, urgent care is highrecommended to supplement primary care, particularly given their extendedoffice hours, usually 8:00 am to 8:00 pm seven days a week.

Emergency Rooms

Emergencyrooms are probably the most commonly understood of the three walk-in clinicsdiscussed here so we won’t go into much detail. Most ERs are open 24 hours aday and specialize in life-threatening conditions and injuries that requiremore advanced technology and highly trained medical personnel and surgeons todiagnose treat. Essentially, they are equipped to handle anything that walksthrough their doors. They also are required by law to accept any and allpatients, regardless of their ability to pay. This fact, among others, oftencauses ER wait times to be several hours and the average cost is many timeslarger than a retail clinic or urgent care.

Forpatients, it really is best to understand the differences – and similarities –between an urgent care and an emergency room relative to their serviceofferings. A recent study found that nearly 50 percent of the diagnoses atemergency rooms could be treated by urgent care centers at a fraction of thecost and wait time. And with more than 9,000 urgent care centers vs. 4,500emergency rooms, there are likely closer, more convenient options available.

Torecap, the main difference between an urgent care center and a walk in clinic is that thewalk-in clinic is a bit of a catch-all term that encompasses many typesof providers including the three discussed here: retail clinics, urgent carecenters and emergency rooms. Know what you are looking for from a healthcareprovider and walk into the right one.

• burns
• primary care
• injuries
• walk-in clinic
• retail clinic
• urgent care