Wait times at Charlotte-area urgent cares can last 2 hours or 15 minutes. Here’s why
Patients at Atrium Health and Novant Health urgent care centers in Charlotte are waiting hours to receive care.
At Atrium, 16 of Atrium Health’s 37 Charlotte area urgent care centers had wait times of more than two hours on Tuesday, and only three had wait times of less than 15 minutes, according to data found on the hospital system’s website.
More than half of Atrium centers with long wait times were in suburbs, including locations in nearby Gastonia, Salisbury and Huntersville.
Of Novant Health’s 18 Charlotte area urgent care locations, only one – in Cornelius – had a wait time of more than three hours, and two locations had wait times of more than one hour, according to its website. Wait times, however, were not available for nine locations.
Why wait times at urgent care facilities fluctuate
Wait times for Novant Health patients are based on a number of factors, including data that is fed into its queuing system and the number of staff working at a particular location, Kirsten Jones, the North Carolina regional president of Novant Health-GoHealth Urgent Care, told The Charlotte Observer in an email.
At Atrium Health, wait times are determined by the number of patients who need care and the complexity of those patients, company spokesperson Brian Hacker told the Observer in an email.
Community density, seasonal illnesses, and time of day can affect the wait times at certain urgent care centers, Jones said. Jones explained that Novant Health urgent care centers are typically the busiest around 8 a.m. and in the evening from 6-8 p.m. daily.
Atrium Health is also seeing more sick patients at its urgent care locations this year than in previous years, and wait times vary throughout the day as a result, Hacker said.
“We are seeing high numbers of sick patients in the summer compared to past years,” said Hacker. “It seems traditional seasonality has waned as we have continued to see flu and Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV) patients in July.”
The uptick in COVID-19 cases in the Charlotte area as the BA.5 omicron variant continues to spread is also leading to longer wait times, said Hacker.
A nationwide shortage of nurses brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic could also be contributing to long wait times at urgent care centers in Charlotte.
Data from NC Nursecast, a workforce model developed by researchers at UNC-Chapel Hill, suggests North Carolina could face an estimated shortage of close to 12,500 registered nurses by 2033.
To combat the nursing staff shortage, both of Charlotte’s major hospital systems implemented sign-on bonuses for multiple positions of up to $45,000, the Observer reported.
How those seeking care can reduce wait times
At Novant Health, patients can expedite the process by pre-registering before visiting an urgent care center, Jones said, adding that patients who book a virtual visit at NovantHealth.org/Virtual-Care can often be seen faster.
For Atrium Health patients, there is not much they can do to shorten wait time because of the unpredictable nature of patient acuity upon arrival at intake, Hacker said. However, urgent care locations do offer patients the option of reserving a spot through an online portal that includes an estimated time when they could be seen by a doctor.
This story was originally published August 16, 2022 at 10:49 AM with the headline "Wait times at Charlotte-area urgent cares can last 2 hours or 15 minutes. Here’s why."
