After 16 acclaimed years of operation, area residents have long considered Atlantic General Hospital the ideal blend of state-of-the-art health care and old-fashioned personal attention — both in-patient and out. But what is becoming equally indisputable is that Atlantic General also represents the region’s vanguard when it comes to the introduction and refinement of cutting-edge medical technology and services, relentlessly pushing the envelope of local health care to all-new highs.
Back in 2002, AGH was the first to introduce on-site open and closed MRI services. In 2007, AGH once again led the way with its “ER 30-minute promise,” in which any patient visiting the emergency room is guaranteed to either be placed in a bed and/or begin to receive treatment within 30 minutes of their arrival. Last year, the 62-bed acute-care facility located in Berlin debuted its electronic medical records system in its Atlantic General Health System provider offices, which databases and retrieves a patient’s entire medical history at the touch of a key, ensuring improved accuracy in addition to more comprehensive treatment protocols.
It should come as no surprise, then, that AGH is at it again in 2009 — this time, with a bold new step in health care that they call Atlantic ImmediCare.
Imagine it’s 5:45 on Wednesday afternoon. You’ve powered-down your workstation and are en route to pick up your 10-year-old from soccer practice. On the way, your cell phone rings: It’s her, your 10-year-old, calling you from the field to tell you through her tears that her left ear really hurts and that her coach thinks she may have a fever. What do you do?
You may try contacting your primary-care physician — that’s assuming you’re lucky enough to get him or her on the phone. If you do, you may get a prescription, but it’s very unlikely your daughter would be examined that day.
Of course, the emergency room has always been an option for those urgent but non-life-threatening illnesses and injuries that constantly seem to find you at the worst possible times. The problems with this scenario, though, are threefold: First, you must make that trip to the hospital, which can be quite inconvenient; second, once there, depending on the facility, your 10-year-old may have to wait in extreme discomfort for what to her (and you) seems an eternity as other, more seriously ill or injured patients receive priority treatment; third, you walk away with a bill for services that could easily be in the hundreds of dollars, excluding the cost of prescriptions.
Well, all that’s about to change, thanks to the brilliant new partnership between AGH and the East Coast’s largest drugstore chain, Rite Aid Pharmacy.
“Atlantic General has a strong understanding of the primary-care needs of the Lower Eastern Shore market,” said Ernie Richardsen, vice president of pharmacy programs and clinical services for Rite Aid. “As the largest health care provider in Worcester County, Atlantic General’s coverage is a great match for selected Rite Aid locations.
“We believe in partnering with established local and regional organizations like Atlantic General,” Richardsen continued, “which already has a reputation for superior health care, in order to deliver the best service for our patients. Now, with ImmediCare, patients will be able to access quality primary-care services at the same place they are being provided first-class pharmacy services, as well as important health and wellness information and products.”
Fall 2009 marked the debut of three pilot clinics, embedded at Rite Aid locations in Ocean Pines, Pocomoke City and Millsboro, Del. Each Atlantic ImmediCare location will offer evening hours during the regular work week until 8 p.m. and seven hours of care on both Saturday and Sunday, starting at 10 a.m.
“Our strategic vision,” said Michael Franklin, president and CEO of Atlantic General, “is to fill a convenience gap in health care that occurs when one doesn’t have ready access to a primary-care physician, yet the situation is not life-threatening. It also provides a very practical solution to anyone with little or no health care coverage, even though the program is certainly open to, and intended for, everyone in the community.”
What that translates to in terms of dollars and cents is that a visit to ImmediCare to treat your 10-year-old’s earache would be about $49. Compare that with what it would cost at either the ER or with your primary-care physician, and the merits of Atlantic ImmediCare become crystal clear.
Like their sister clinic in Ocean City, Townsend Medical Center on 10th Street, the ImmediCare locations will not accept private insurance or Medicare directly; rather, they will help facilitate the process of reimbursement between the patient and his or her insurance provider.
Each ImmediCare location will be a level 2 health care facility that is staffed by a bona fide nurse practitioner, who is licensed to practice medicine independently subject to the supervision of a licensed physician. It’s like an RN but with even more advanced training including the ability to provide prescriptions when necessary for treatment.
In order to ensure the continuity of excellence that the Eastern Shore community has come to think of as synonymous with Atlantic General Hospital, the forward-thinking ImmediCare program is being overseen by an elite triumvirate of AGH administrators. James Brannon, vice president of Professional Services, is ImmediCare’s chief administrative officer, while Dr. Nicholas Borodulia is its chief medical officer. Charged with the responsibility of overseeing the program’s clinical component, meanwhile, is Andi West-McCabe, MS, BSN, RN, NE-BC.
“We’re really excited about this initiative,” said West-McCabe, who is also AGH’s director of emergency services. “It’s the best of both worlds: quality care that is quick yet conveniently located and very reasonably priced.”
“More than ever before, people are very busy and tend to lead rather hectic lives,” Franklin confirmed. “For example, just 30 years ago, only 25 percent of women worked outside the home. Today, that figure has risen to 75 percent. So there are quality-of-life challenges that contemporary American families face that really need to be addressed — especially by the essential-service providers of a community. That’s the whole point of Atlantic ImmediCare: to eliminate or at least circumvent the barriers that individuals face when trying to seek quality health care for themselves and those they love.”
For more information, visit
www.atlanticimmediatecare.com
