Tenet Doubles Down on Urgent Care Facilities

As consumers take on more of the responsibility of paying for healthcare, the popularity of walk-in retail health clinics is surging. Tenet says it's set to double the number of its retail health clinics this year.

In a nod to the growing influence of consumer-driven healthcare, Tenet Healthcare Corporation this week announced that it will double the number of walk-in clinics in its MedPost Urgent Care franchise by the end of this year.

Kyle Burtnett, Tenet's senior vice president, outpatient services, says MedPost is a key component in the Dallas-based for-profit hospital chain's push to grow its outpatient facilities. That growth is part of a broader corporate strategy to offer more services in faster-growing, less-capital intensive and higher-margin businesses.

Burtnett says MedPost is addressing healthcare consumer demand for access to more convenient, less-expensive care.

"Consumers are so used to having everything at the touch of their fingers, whether it is on their smartphones or just having things so conveniently located to where you live and work that when people are sick they want to be able to get care in the same day," Burtnett told me.

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"The other thing is you also have patients bearing much more responsibility for the financial aspects of their treatment. Rather than go to an emergency department and incur higher costs, consumers bearing more of the responsibility are taking a much closer look at how they are spending their healthcare dollars. That plays right into urgent care's role as a much more affordable solution."

Tenet now operates 23 MedPost Urgent Care centers in Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, Missouri, Tennessee and Texas. They were all recently rebranded under the MedPost name.

Placed in strip malls or as stand-alone facilities, the new clinics will be open seven days a week with extended daily hours. MedPosts will be staffed by primary care and emergency physicians, nurse practitioners, and other healthcare professionals, and will be equipped with imaging and lab services.

The following is an edited transcript of my conversation with Burtnett earlier this week.

HLM: Did the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act influence your decision to expand?

Burtnett: We were looking to move forward and start developing urgent care centers before that happened, but I definitely view it as a plus. When you think about people today that don't have health insurance, they are able to access the acute care system by going to an emergency department because of (Emergency MedicalTreatment and Labor Act) requirements.

But the part of the system they are not able to access is the outpatient care area. Obviously, with the ACA, more and more people are getting coverage [and] that is opening up a whole new patient base to your services. So, we think that it's definitely a positive from the outpatient perspective.

HLM: Was part of your rationale for expansion the thought that if you didn't do it, someone else would?

Burtnett: Yes. You see a lot of activity in the urgent care space. The markets where we are operating with the hospital presence or the outpatient presence you are seeing a lot of activity. First of all there are a fair number of urgent care centers up and operating today. But you are also seeing de nouveau development activity in various markets. You are seeing other people expand on a more regional or a national basis as well.

HLM: Emergency departments are an important inpatient access point at many hospitals. Is there any way to estimate how MedPost will affect inpatient admissions at Tenet hospitals?

Burtnett: I don't think there is any firm data on the amount of referrals into the health system. We are making sure that patients receive the appropriate care at the time of service at the urgent care center. If they do need a referral, whether to the ED for a higher level of care or a specialist to follow up on a particular issue, then we are trying to do that within our family of services. That is something we are cognizant of.

HLM: How much does it cost to set up a MedPost clinic?

Burtnett: If you want a ballpark, it is probably between $600,000 and $800,000 to get one built out and operational.

HLM: Do you see MedPost as a low-cost opportunity for Tenet to expand into competitors' service areas?

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Burtnett: Right now we are looking in our existing markets. Hopefully they will prove to be so successful that we think it is a great business opportunity and decide to expand. But first and foremost we have a lot of work to do as far as building out a robust network of urgent care centers within our pretty big geographic footprint at this point.

HLM: Can you build Tenet brand loyalty through MedPost?

Burtnett: First and foremost we need to take good care of people when they are there. They need to receive excellent care from our physicians and medical staff. Then hopefully they received not only great care but tremendous patient experience, [and] customer satisfaction. That's what we are counting on to build up brand loyalty.

HLM: How are you addressing price transparency?

Burtnett: I'm not entirely satisfied but we are making progress. The majority of our contracts we have a global rate. If you come into the center it costs you 'X' dollars whether you have an X-ray or not. You are still going to be charged that amount.

So it is very easy to understand and explain to the consumers who walk into the center. Where I would like to get more advanced, and we don't have this today, but we are working on it, is just more transparency related to self-pay or cash pricing and making sure we have that easily accessible on our Web site for consumers to view.

HLM: In what other ways do you expect Tenet will become more consumer-centric?

Burtnett: One of our early forays is just with the Web site and social media efforts. But you will see those types of forays in other areas in the more traditional hospital portfolio. That will be one thing. Focusing on ease of use and access. Making sure that people can not only find us but easily access us, whether that is on-line registration or scheduling. Those are things we are going to be focusing on in the future.

HLM: Are traditional healthcare providers laggards in customer satisfaction behind retail and other sectors of the economy?

Burtnett: As far as customer service and focusing on patient satisfaction, that is something that the healthcare system has done for a long time. It's now moved even more to the forefront with the (Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems) surveys.

But where I'd say where we've missed, is [in] being a little more retail oriented–outreach to consumers, going direct to consumers. We focused on that patient that comes into our center, making sure they receive good customer service, that they are treated well, etc. But it is that outreach that I think we've missed a little bit.

We are going to launch social media platforms that I hope engage consumers and potential patients, build a very robust Web site that will continue to make enhancements, and hopefully that will provide patients with a very easy and efficient way to access our system and find us.

The ability to have your Web site pop up and be easy to use on a mobile device is just incredibly important. That is another area we are focusing on.