May 12th, 2016  Four Seasons Pediatrics would like to provide an update about Urgent Care Centers in our area.  We are working hard to provide more options for our office to see your child for illnesses.  We now offer on-line appointments for your convenience.  Please note, our doctors review all urgent care visits.  Due to the increasing number of urgent care centers, we feel that the quality of pediatric care has been significantly diluted.     We have seen inappropriate and potentially harmful care given or recommended.   In some cases we have had to intervene and call the families to change the plan.

Here are some suggestions that we hope will be useful to you:

• Four Seasons Pediatrics has open same day appointments every day during the week.  In as much as we can predict how much illness will occur, we do our best to make sure that when you have a same day need, we can accommodate it.
• There are certainly times that you may have a need for an urgent care or emergency room visit.  In these cases, we would like to assist you to be sure that you get the best care in the best place.  We will provide guidance (in the office or the doctor on call) as to which center is the best based on the age of your child and the concern you have.  We are on call 24/7 to help guide you with your concerns.
• On weekends we will see you and we want to see you! Call around 8am and leave a message if you want to be seen that morning.  Although the message indicates the office is closed for regular appointments, we will be available for urgent problems.

We also want to let you know what is going on behind the scenes.  We have tried to work with some of the Urgent Centers/Emergent Cares to improve care.  We have offered to teach and discuss care with these Centers.  We have not seen significant changes attempted, nor have we been taken up on our offers to assist providers in improving their current knowledge of pediatric care.

If you do end up in the Emergency Room or Urgent Care on a weekend, or after hours; please let the office know so we can obtain the notes and make them part of your child’s chart.

Please remember our mission is to provide the very best in pediatric care.  This includes care in and out of our office.  We will continue to review urgent care visits and follow up with you if a change in management is needed.