When to Consider Urgent Care Over a Routine Visit
Jun 02, 2023
Urgent care definitely plays a key role in helping you stay healthy. But it’s not always the right choice for every medical need.
At CN Internal Medicine, we offer both urgent care and regular office visits to help our patients in Alexandria and Lansdowne, Virginia, get the right type of care when they need it. In this post, our team gives you the information you need to decide which type of care is right for you.
Urgent care services can be the right choice when you have a medical issue that needs prompt care, but isn’t a medical emergency. Our team is skilled in providing urgent care services for a wide array of medical concerns, including:
For these and other urgent care needs, we offer same-day visits to relieve your symptoms and prevent your condition from getting worse.
To ensure you get the best care for your urgent needs, we offer an on-site lab for urinalysis, blood testing, and nose and throat swab analysis, along with on-site diagnostic imaging for X-rays and ultrasounds, as well as EKG testing.
Urgent care visits are not the right choice for any medical issue requiring emergency care, including life-threatening injuries, like heart attacks, chest pain, major head injuries, or compound fractures. Breathing emergencies also warrant a call to 911 rather than an urgent care visit.
Routine visits are the better choice for annual physical exams. By scheduling a visit, you give your doctor time to prepare and review your medical records. We may also ask you to have bloodwork or other lab tests performed before your visit, so we can review your results during your exam.
A routine visit can also be a good choice for managing chronic diseases, like high blood pressure, high cholesterol, or diabetes. Likewise, It’s ideal for long-term health management plans, including lifestyle changes that can help you stay healthy as you age.
Regular routine visits also enable us to maintain an ongoing record of your medical and health history. This history helps us spot early signs of disease and recommend treatments, vaccinations, and testing based on your unique risk factors.
Both urgent care and routine visits serve key roles in meeting your health care needs. To schedule a regular office visit or an urgent care appointment, call 703-212-9190 or request an appointment online with our team at CN Internal Medicine today.