The Role of Urgent Care X-Ray Services in Providing Fast and Effective Medical Care
Urgent care fills a crucial role in our communities, providing vital medical care to sick and injured patients whose needs fall between the capabilities of regular doctors’ offices and the more critical response of an emergency room.
Here, we explain how doctors use urgent care x-rays to diagnose broken bones and other injuries, including abdominal concerns and lung screenings. Learn the benefits of visiting an urgent care center for an x-ray instead of the emergency room.
For more information on our urgent care services, call 626-304-0404 today!
What Are X-Rays?
Also known as radiographs, x-ray machines scan portions of the body with tiny bursts of radiation and produce black-and-white images of bones, tissues, and the occasional foreign object. Doctors use x-rays as diagnostic tools to see inside the body and diagnose illnesses or injuries.
More than 70% of urgent care centers use digital x-ray machines, which improve patient care in several ways. Digital x-rays offer fast, accurate imaging with almost 80% less radiation exposure than traditional x-rays. Digital x-rays also perform at a fraction of the cost, saving urgent care centers and their patient’s money.
The digital platform allows instant image delivery with zoom and contrast functions that provide sharper images that doctors can easily manipulate to better see results. This promotes faster response times, better diagnoses, and more effective patient care. Doctors can easily send, store, and print digital x-rays to provide better continuity of care to patients, ensuring that imaging records remain available over time and to the patient’s other doctors.
Why Get an X-Ray?
Some of the most common injuries urgent care facilities treat involve bones. Sports injuries frequently occur in younger patients, while bone fractures from falls and impacts and stress fractures remain particularly common in the general population.
Urgent care x-rays mean these patients don’t need to wait in the emergency room, allowing doctors to diagnose fractures, sprains, and other common injuries and treat them efficiently.
X-rays are a safe, non-invasive method to diagnose many abdominal and lung conditions. These scans let doctors view the stomach, bladder, kidneys, liver, lungs, and even the heart. With x-rays at urgent care, doctors can quickly rule out critical medical concerns that require the patient to go to the emergency room and safely evaluate non-critical conditions for faster, more complete care.
X-Rays at Urgent Care Benefit Patients
By diverting non-emergency patients to urgent care, local emergency rooms and hospitals conserve resources and focus on the patients who need them most. Meanwhile, patients receive accurate results and faster, more effective care at urgent centers employing x-ray technology.
When you need urgent medical care and a diagnosis for a broken bone or another injury, visit Advance Urgent Care of Pasadena for urgent care x-ray services. Call 626-304-0404 to learn more.