Retail Clinics as part of your Health Care Team

Intro: MemorialCare Health System, excellence in healthcare, presents Weekly Dose of Wellness. Here's your host, Deborah Howell.

Deborah Howell (Host): Hello and welcome to the show. You're listening to Weekly Dose of Wellness, brought to you by MemorialCare Health System. I'm Deborah Howell, and today's guest is Shelly Lummus, a board-certified family nurse practitioner with over 25 years of healthcare experience in both the acute inpatient and outpatient settings. She received her Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Cal State University, Long Beach, and her Master's degree in Nursing from the University of California, Los Angeles, and a doctoral degree in Organizational Leadership from Pepperdine University. Whew, Shelly, that's a lot of schooling.

Shelly Lummus, NP: Yes, it is.

Deborah Howell (Host): All right, let's jump right in. What is retail health and what is a retail health clinic?

Shelly Lummus, NP: Retail health clinics really began about 13 years ago and started by providing a resource in the community that was convenient and accessible to help treat non-emergent health conditions. So the whole point about being convenient is that they're there seven days a week, because the reality is people don't always get sick Monday through Friday, 8:00 to 5:00.

Deborah Howell (Host): And they usually get sick on Sundays. Let's face it.

Shelly Lummus, NP: Absolutely. Sunday afternoon, typically, too.

Deborah Howell (Host): Yes. So these clinics are open seven days, but is it 24/7?

Shelly Lummus, NP: No. The Health Express clinics, actually, we're located inside an Albertsons grocery store.

Deborah Howell (Host): Wow.

Shelly Lummus, NP: And we're open Monday through Friday, 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. Saturday, 9:00 to 5:00, and Sunday, 10:00 to 6:00.

Deborah Howell (Host): And who can visit the Health Express clinics?

Shelly Lummus, NP: Actually, we see patients aged two and above. And at our Health Express clinics, we accept most PPO insurance plans. We can see HMO plans that are part of MemorialCare Medical Group. And then the other important piece is besides being a convenient option, it's a very affordable option. So for those who are uninsured, this is a great opportunity to get some great healthcare at a much more reasonable cost.

Deborah Howell (Host): Oh, it is about time. I just want to say amen. I mean, when I lived in New York, there was one clinic called The Doctor's Walk-in, and without that, I don't think I'd be alive because you just need a flu shot or you need to just get your throat looked at, you know, and it shouldn't take a two-week delay till you can see your doctor.

Shelly Lummus, NP: Right, and you want something that's in your community that's easy to get in and out of, makes sense if you have to stop at the grocery store. If you needed a prescription, you could pick up your prescription right there. So again, that convenience factor plays an important role for everybody's very busy lives.

Deborah Howell (Host): We've talked about a couple of reasons you could go in, but what are the conditions that are treated at Health Express?

Shelly Lummus, NP: So we see common conditions, non-emergent conditions. So the things that drive everyone crazy, the coughs, the colds, the child with the ear infection, the bladder infection, pink eye. We're also a great resource for providing immunizations. Probably one of the great offerings that we have is that we're able to provide an affordable resource for school, sports, camp physicals. So high school students, everyone needs to get these physicals, and the problem is, especially the teens, they tend to not tell their parents till the very last minute and then everyone's in a scramble. So here we are.

Deborah Howell (Host): Exactly. That is, I can't be, I'm very excited before I talked to you, I didn't know this existed. This is wonderful. I mean, I was thrilled this year to be able to just walk into a grocery store and get a flu shot. I can't even tell you how much time that saved me.

Shelly Lummus, NP: Absolutely.

Deborah Howell (Host): So how long is the typical wait and do you need an appointment?

Shelly Lummus, NP: You do not need an appointment, so it's all walk-in. And typically the wait can be no wait or, you know, 15 minutes. Obviously that can vary seasonally. So during cold and flu season, we can be really busy and it might be 20 minutes or so. But we have this great process where just like at a restaurant, we can hand someone a pager and say, go sit at Starbucks, read a magazine. When this goes off, it's your turn, come on back.

Deborah Howell (Host): Go pick up some shiitake mushrooms for tonight's dinner. I love that, that's so efficient. And we talked a little bit about not only the convenience, but the expense factor. How much is a typical visit?

Shelly Lummus, NP: So for someone who is insured, the visit is the same as their copayment that they would pay at a primary care provider. So if they have no copayment, it doesn't cost them anything. The copayment amount for the primary care provider typically is less than an urgent care copayment, and definitely less than an emergency room copayment. And then for those who are uninsured, the average cost of a visit is $59.

Deborah Howell (Host): This is just nothing but great news. You just want to say yay. We're a first-world country, yay, we can get medical care and shiitake mushrooms at the same time. All right, what makes MemorialCare Health Express unique in terms of the retail healthcare experience?

Shelly Lummus, NP: I think what makes this unique is that we, at Health Express, we're part of something much bigger. So we're part of MemorialCare Medical Group, and we're part of MemorialCare Health System. So that means that we have access to any and all resources that a patient might need. So it's important that we work very closely with each patient's primary care provider. And really when you think about it, we can just be an extension of their primary care provider. So that we can communicate directly back to the primary care provider with the information on a patient's visit so that it can feel seamless for the patient and there's no disruption in their care. And then for those patients who don't have a primary care provider, we have access to all of our affiliated physicians to be able to provide them resources.

Deborah Howell (Host): Awesome. So your primary care physician will be notified that you were treated at MemorialCare Health Express, they'll exchange information, and it will be seamless for you.

Shelly Lummus, NP: Absolutely.

Deborah Howell (Host): This is way too good. This is just way too good. All right, now, what if the Health Express clinician thinks I'm seriously ill, something more than a little scratchy throat, so what's the follow-up with my primary care physician at that point?

Shelly Lummus, NP: So we have a couple of things. One is if we really think the condition is much more than something we're able to treat, let's say we decide we really need a chest x-ray. Well, in our small environment, we can't do that. So we can ensure that we get a patient to the appropriate level of care and we can help facilitate that. If that means us calling ahead, getting the appointment, moving them through a kind of a walk-in situation at an urgent care, we can help do that. And then for all of our patients that we see, whether they're, whether we're sending them to a different level of care or even if we treated them, every patient is provided with very detailed and specific follow-up instructions. One, about following up with their primary care provider and when to do that. And then also based on the condition that they were treated for, should they see any worsening of the condition, we also provide, we call everyone two days after their appointment. We want to follow up and make sure that they're doing better, and again, if they're not, then we're providing them direction and guidance on what to do next.

Deborah Howell (Host): I don't even get that from my regular doctor.

Shelly Lummus, NP: It's the retail concept.

Deborah Howell (Host): That's amazing. That's amazing. And if, again, we will underline this, I know you mentioned it once, but if you don't have a primary care doctor?

Shelly Lummus, NP: Yes, then we can provide resources. So we do really feel it's very important that patients have a primary care provider and have that relationship, because it's important for overall health. So we try to really help people, we provide them resources, and in fact, if someone really needs to get in, oftentimes we'll call and help them make an appointment.

Deborah Howell (Host): This is tremendous. I just want to thank the people who thought of this because it really is genius, and gonna help so many people.

Shelly Lummus, NP: Absolutely. And it's really all part of MemorialCare really trying to bring healthcare to every level so that people have access and convenience and, you know, can have the resources that they need.

Deborah Howell (Host): A mother with four kids, think about it.

Shelly Lummus, NP: Absolutely. I mean because a child gets an earache, you pick them up from school on Friday afternoon, and they say their ear hurts, and they're running a fever. What are you gonna do?

Deborah Howell (Host): Exactly. Well, there are urgent care centers, but even those, the weights can be, you know, ridiculous.

Shelly Lummus, NP: They can be, and especially during the cold and flu season, they tend to be, you know, much more significant. So again, it just offers another great resource for people.

Deborah Howell (Host): Is there anything else you'd like to add about the retail experience, retail is sometimes a word you want to shy away from because everybody wants it wholesale. But in this case it just means the location.

Shelly Lummus, NP: It's really about the location, and we've been able to partner with Albertsons Sav-On here in Orange County. And they also really support that overall healthy lifestyle for people. And so that's been a great relationship, and again, I think it just really reflects what MemorialCare is trying to do to be able to have access points for anyone and everyone so that they can receive that quality care.

Deborah Howell (Host): And not for nothing, but it's just, we are what we eat, so it makes really perfect sense that you're there next to the red peppers and the green peppers and the spinach, and you can go right from your little what you call a clinic appointment to getting some healthy food to ensure that the medicines you take have a place to, you know, interact with this good food and get you well.

Shelly Lummus, NP: Absolutely. So it makes sense.

Deborah Howell (Host): Let's talk about how people can find out more about Health Express.

Shelly Lummus, NP: Yes, so people can access us through the website, so at memorialcare.org, and we have a toll-free number, 1-877-250-7104.

Deborah Howell (Host): Thank you so, so much, Shelly. It's just been illuminating and I'm really pumped for everybody in your area. Thank you for the great work you're doing.

Shelly Lummus, NP: Thank you very much.

Deborah Howell (Host): I'm Deborah Howell. Join us again next time as we explore another Weekly Dose of Wellness brought to you by MemorialCare Health System.