Urgent care treats many illnesses and minor injuries that need prompt attention but are not life-threatening. Emergency rooms treat serious conditions where delaying care could cause major harm. The right choice depends on your symptoms, their severity, and how quickly they are changing.
If you have symptoms of a life-threatening emergency, call 911. Do not delay emergency care to compare prices, check wait times, or contact an urgent care clinic.
What’s the Difference Between Urgent Care and the ER?
Urgent care and emergency rooms both provide medical care when you cannot wait for a routine appointment, but they serve different purposes.
What Urgent Care Treats
Urgent care provides prompt treatment for non-life-threatening illnesses and minor injuries. Depending on the location, services may include basic testing, wound care, stitches, splinting, and X-rays. Available services vary by clinic.
What Emergency Rooms Treat
Emergency rooms evaluate and treat serious or potentially life-threatening conditions. They have access to advanced testing, emergency procedures, and hospital-level care. Emergency departments operate 24 hours a day.
How Wait Times Differ
Emergency departments prioritize patients according to the severity of their condition, not simply their arrival time. Someone with a life-threatening emergency may be treated before a person who arrived earlier with less urgent symptoms. Wait times vary at both urgent care clinics and emergency departments.
What to Know About Costs
For non-emergency care, check your insurance coverage and ask about expected charges. Your costs will depend on your coverage and the services provided.
Cost should never be a reason to delay emergency treatment.
When to Go to the ER or Call 911
Choose emergency care for symptoms that could be life-threatening or cause serious harm if treatment is delayed.
Examples include:
- Chest pain or symptoms of a heart attack.
- Severe trouble breathing.
- Sudden facial drooping, weakness, or difficulty speaking.
- Uncontrolled bleeding.
- A severe allergic reaction.
- Major trauma or a serious head injury.
- Loss of consciousness.
- Severe burns.
- Sudden, severe pain.
- Significant dehydration or signs of a serious infection.
Call 911 for a life-threatening emergency, including a suspected heart attack or stroke. Do not wait for an urgent care appointment.
This list is not exhaustive. If symptoms are severe, rapidly worsening, or affecting breathing, alertness, or normal functioning, seek emergency care rather than relying on a checklist alone.
When Urgent Care May Be Appropriate
Urgent care may be appropriate when symptoms are bothersome but stable, need attention soon, and do not suggest a medical emergency. It can also help when you cannot get a timely appointment with your primary care provider.
Common Illnesses
Examples include:
- Cold and flu symptoms
- Sore throats
- Ear infections
- Minor rashes
- Other uncomplicated illnesses that need prompt evaluation
Explore Our Minor Illness Services
Minor Injuries
Examples include:
- Minor cuts and wounds
- Sprains and strains
- Some suspected fractures, depending on the injury and available services
Explore Our Minor Injury Services
Physicals, Screenings, and Preventive Services
Looking for a physical, screening, or another non-emergency service? Explore our evaluative and preventive medical services.
Why the Severity of Symptoms Matters
A symptom or injury name does not always tell you where to go. Some suspected fractures can be evaluated at urgent care, while serious injuries need emergency care. Similarly, an uncomplicated infection and signs of a serious systemic infection require different levels of care.
Consider:
- How severe the symptoms are.
- Whether they started suddenly or are worsening quickly.
- Whether breathing, alertness, or normal functioning is affected.
- Whether the clinic has the services needed to assess the problem.
What If You’re Not Sure Where to Go?
If symptoms are severe, rapidly worsening, or affecting your ability to breathe, think clearly, or function normally, emergency care is the safer choice. Do not spend valuable time trying to identify the cause yourself.
For non-emergency questions about clinic hours, age requirements, or available services, contact the urgent care location you plan to visit. Calling a clinic should not delay emergency treatment.
Contact Us About Clinic Services
Why Urgent Care Omaha Clinics?
Click here to see why you should send your next injured employee to an Urgent Care Network location.
Our Urgent Care Walk-In Clinics in Omaha, Bennington, West Omaha, Rockbrook, Crossroads & Bellevue, NE
Our staff works to provide prompt, personal, and professional care for all of our patients. We strive to provide the attention patients need in as quick a time as possible. Urgent Care Clinics in Omaha & Bellevue, Nebraska has three locations in the Omaha metropolitan area. Our three walk-in clinics are:
- Rockbrook Urgent Care
- Crossroads Urgent Care
- Bellevue Urgent Care
- West Omaha Urgent Care
- Bennington Urgent Care
Disclaimer
The information contained on this webpage is for educational purposes as well as to provide general information and general understanding of the pertinent medical issue only, not to provide a specific diagnosis. This information is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice. By using this blog/web site you understand there is no doctor patient relationship between you and the blog/web site publisher. The information included on this site should not be used as a substitute for medical advice from a licensed medical professional in your state. Neither Urgent Care Network, its subsidiaries, affiliates, assignees or successors in interest, nor any other party assume liability for loss or damage due to reliance on content of this blog/web site. If you are experiencing a severe medical issue, you should seek emergency assistance immediately.
