Ocracoke Health Center Announces Change In Clinic Hours
These expanded hours will be offered in order to reduce the need of the after-hours on call provider service that the clinic has provided for many years. The Ocracoke Health Center will be discontinuing this after-hours on call provider service beginning April 1, 2014.
The Health Center will utilize an after-hours nurse call line. When patients seek after-hours medical advice, they will be able to call 252-928-SICK and talk directly to a nurse for assistance. The nurse will be able to guide the patient as to whether the patient needs further medical service, such as 911, or if the problem can be treated during regular office hours. The Health Center is also planning on a limited after-hours provider on call service during weekend hours. During that time, all true emergencies will continue to be referred to 911 and EMS services, and the on-call provider would be available for urgent medical care as needed.
Since 2003, the Health Center has employed two, full-time, medical providers that alternately worked in the clinic and provided after-hours care. In place of costly, per hour on-call service, the providers were paid full time salaries with full time benefits. This system worked well for many years. But over the last several years, the decrease in income generated by after-hours visits, the strain on Occupancy Tax funding and the lack of grant funding for after-hours, has left us with insufficient funding to cover the costs of after-hours care. The after-hours service was carefully scrutinized for cost effectiveness and utilization. The need for the service has progressively declined. The Clinic Medical Director, Dr. Erin Baker, along with the Board of Directors and Cheryl Ballance, CEO, determined that expanded hours and a Saturday clinic would cover the majority of the visits we reviewed.
Over the last 3 years only 7% of our total patient visits were made as after-hours visits. Of that, 27% were tourist patients. Of further interest, approximately 28% of those visits were for patients that were aged 65 or older, or aged 5 and under. These ages represent the most vulnerable populations whose health status changes frequently. These populations could also be better served by expanding the clinic hours. The Health Center is actively seeking out these vulnerable patients and monitoring their health conditions. We will also be contacting care-givers so that a medical plan can be developed in order to minimize the need for direct after-hours medical care.
We welcome community input and concerns and will make arrangements to meet with all individuals who have concerns about their care. We will also be working with the Hyde County EMS so that they are aware that we will not be handling emergency calls as in the past. Our goal is to provide a patient centered medical home to our community and to continue to provide quality medical care.
