Urgent Care Clinics

In late February 2025, Alexandria, Va., resident Alex Treadway woke up with extreme pain in his right shoulder; it was so bad he could barely eat breakfast or work on his laptop. The pain lasted through the day, even after he took ibuprofen, and Treadway couldn’t sleep that evening.

He thought about going to his primary care doctor but knew it would take weeks to get an appointment. So his wife suggested he head to MedStar Health Urgent Care, located in a shopping center less than two miles from their house.

Treadway made an appointment online for that day. When he arrived, he waited five minutes before being called to see a doctor, who ordered an X-ray and diagnosed him with a probable torn rotator cuff. She prescribed him oral steroids, helped him get into a shoulder brace, and referred him to an orthopedic surgeon for follow-up. His out-of-pocket cost: $234.

“The whole experience was so easy and pleasant that it blew me away,” Treadway said. “Why isn’t all of healthcare like this?”

Treadway’s experience of getting fast high-quality care is one reason why millions of Americans are turning to urgent care centers. As of mid-2025, there were 15,116 facilities in the U.S.—almost twice as many as the 7,983 centers that existed in 2015, according to the Urgent Care Association, an industry group.

A big reason for this shift is a chronic shortage of primary care doctors, which is making it harder than ever to get medical appointments. And hospital emergency rooms often have long wait times; averages at many facilities range from nearly two hours to more than five hours. Care at urgent care clinics, on the other hand, usually takes about an hour, and many clinics are open into early-evening hours and on weekends.

But while Treadway’s recent experience was positive, there are things you should consider before seeking help at an urgent care center. In particular, consider potential increased out-of-pocket costs and the challenge of assessing quality of care at such a facility.

When to Consider Urgent Care

If you are generally in good health and are experiencing a non-life-threatening illness or injury that needs immediate attention, urgent care can be a good option, said Ateev Mehrotra, M.D., M.P.H., chair of the Department of Health Services, Policy and Practice at the Brown University School of Public Health, who studies urgent care.

“Going to urgent care for something simple, like stitches, makes a lot of sense, especially if you cannot get into your primary care doctor in a timely basis,” said Mehrotra.

Conditions urgent care centers usually treat include fevers, flu or cold symptoms, ear infections, animal or insect bites, seasonal allergies, bronchitis, a sprain or broken bone, a cut that requires stitches, a urinary tract infection, a sexually transmitted infection, or minor bellyache or back pain.

Most urgent care centers take walk-in patients and appointments. Generally, they are staffed by physician assistants, nurse practitioners, nurses, and at least one family or emergency care physician, said Franz Ritucci, M.D., president of the American Board of Urgent Care Medicine.

Urgent care centers have procedure rooms and on-site diagnostic equipment such as X-ray machines and blood testing equipment as well as supplies, including stitches, casts, splints, and local anesthetics for low-risk procedures, such as treating a laceration.

“Urgent care has really grown as an option because of accessibility in terms of timing and location,” said Benjamin Ukert, Ph.D., assistant professor of health economics at Texas A&M University School of Public Health. “Unlike most primary care doctors, they are open after work and on weekends, and are in convenient locations, like shopping centers, rather than office buildings. And the wait is much shorter than in emergency rooms.”

Urgent care is different from retail clinics, like CVS MinuteClinics, which it says are staffed by nurse practitioners or physician assistants and provide care for a limited number of minor conditions, such as allergies, colds, infections, and vaccinations, or for doing simple tests, such as for strep. But retail clinics don’t have diagnostic equipment and generally don’t treat broken bones and lacerations that need stitches.

Mehrotra does not recommend using urgent care if you are someone living with multiple chronic conditions, such as diabetes or heart failure, or are taking multiple drugs. That’s because most urgent care centers don’t have access to an individual’s medical records and are missing context needed for appropriate care.

Mehrotra also does not recommend using an urgent care facility as primary care.

“Good health care is about an ongoing relationship between a physician and patient, and you can’t get that with urgent care,” he said.

Urgent Care Can Be Costly

An urgent care visit usually costs less than going to an emergency room, but it is generally more expensive than going to see a primary care physician.

Costs vary widely, depending on the hospital and the complexity of care needed, but on average patients pay more than $1,000 for ER visits. Copays for appointments with primary care doctors usually run $0 to $50. An urgent care visit will cost in the range of $125 to $290, said the American Board of Urgent Care Medicine’s Ritucci.

Do check on costs before using an urgent care facility. Over the past decade, an increasing number of hospitals have opened their own urgent care centers and don’t always make it clear that they might charge high fees for tests, procedures, and diagnostics, said Ukert. “Unfortunately, it is on the consumer to have to ask questions ahead of time,” he said.

Katherine Reed learned this lesson in January 2024. While the Asheville, N.C., resident was visiting her son in Miami, Fla., she developed a gastrointestinal problem that she thought might be caused by an intestinal parasite. Because she couldn’t see her primary care doctor, she went to urgent care.

Reed checked her health insurance website for an in-network center and found one—Baptist Health Urgent Care in Coral Gables. She walked in and made a copay of $150 for the visit. A physician and nurse examined her and said they would run some lab tests on a stool sample. They sent her home without a diagnosis but prescribed something for related itching that she was experiencing.

She was shocked when, one month later, she received a bill for $3,000, of which only $1,349 was paid by her insurance. The itemized bill said she was charged a facility fee of $900, $1,799 for 11 lab tests, and additional fees for three consulting physicians.

“I did not see three doctors, and I don’t know why they did 11 lab tests,” said Reed, who appealed the bill to her insurer but was denied.

Reed said she did not see that the website of the urgent care center she visited describes itself as “a department of South Miami Hospital.” And because the center was located in a strip mall, she didn’t know to ask if the center was charging hospital fees or urgent care fees.

“Even if I did know that it was a department of a hospital…how was I to know that they would charge me four times the average rate for an urgent care visit?” she asked.

Baptist Health South Florida, which owns the urgent care center, did not respond to a request for comment.

To reduce the chances of receiving a bill with unexpected fees, Mehrotra and Ukert recommend the following procedures:

• Research and call urgent care centers near your home before you need care, provide details about your insurance coverage, and ask about your out-of-pocket costs.
• Know that some urgent care centers are actually licensed freestanding emergency rooms. This means they operate like emergency rooms and are open 24/7 but aren’t affiliated with a hospital—but bill for services like one. Ask whether they will charge fees as an urgent care clinic, hospital department, or emergency room, and for an estimate of your share of costs. Get the name of the person you speak with, in case you are provided incorrect information.
• Find out if the urgent care center takes your health insurance. Most, but not all, urgent care centers accept Medicare. Some accept Medicaid, but many do not. Most take private insurance but might not be part of your plan’s network, which increases your costs.
• Check on your copay fee—it may be higher for urgent care than for a primary care doctor.
• If you are getting a test, ask for the cost and whether it is bundled with the office visit fee. If you receive an X-ray, ask if there is a separate fee for imaging or for radiology consultations/reports.
• Many urgent care centers have self-pay options that offer a discount for paying cash. If you are uninsured, ask about this.

It’s Difficult to Compare Quality of Care 

Urgent care centers generally operate like private medical practices under either an individual physician’s license or a hospital license. But because of the episodic nature of urgent care, it is unlikely you will know whether a physician, physician assistant, or nurse will provide your care. This makes it almost impossible to research providers in advance, including whether they’ve faced any malpractice claims or disciplinary actions.

“With urgent care, you don’t know who you are going to see,” Mehrotra said. “Despite their ubiquity, we don’t have as much data as you might expect or want about the quality of care being provided at urgent care centers.”

One measure to consider is whether a center has sought voluntary accreditation from either the Urgent Care Association (UCA) or the National Urgent Care Center Accreditation (NUCCA). Accreditation suggests that the center has met criteria such as valid licenses for the medical director, an organizational and management structure, facility floor plan, and has demonstrated it has an X-ray machine and lab equipment as well as adequate medical supplies on hand. As of early 2025, 2,200 urgent care centers in the U.S. had received UCA accreditation and more than 200 received NUCCA accreditation.

The American Board of Urgent Care Medicine’s Ritucci advises people to seek an urgent care center that is open at least 12 hours during weekdays and on at least one weekend day because it indicates the center has adequate staff.

And you can always look at online reviews of urgent care centers; here at Checkbook.org, you’ll find ratings from our members.

What to Do in a Medical Emergency

If You Believe Your Case Might Be Life-Threatening, Call 911

Urgent care clinics cannot provide comprehensive emergency medical care. If you believe your condition—or someone else’s—may be an immediate threat to life or future ability to function—and must be treated within 30 minutes—call 911.

Symptoms requiring immediate emergency department attention include:

• Spurting blood, massive bleeding
• Vomiting blood (often a black coffee ground-like substance), passing black stool, coughing blood
• Breathing stopped
• Breathing difficult
• Blue lips, face, or nail beds
• Heart stopped or faint pulse
• Extensive burns, especially if skin is white or charred
• Eye injuries, or acids or other strong solutions in the eye
• Paralysis
• Unequal-sized pupils
• Obvious alteration in consciousness resulting from head injury or without attributable cause
• Insect stings, if patient is known to have allergy
• Seizure or convulsions
• Severe pains in chest, upper abdomen, or down arm, plus shortness of breath
• Suspected poisoning or overdose
• Sudden severe abdominal pain not attributed to indigestion
• Suicidal thoughts or any violent behavior or threats
• Patient simply appears to be very sick