Heavy CBN community response to the Dr. Shanik article about urgent care and Tele-health
1. If some doctors didn’t keep you waiting for hours in the waiting room, people actually might go! The local PA by me is in and out in 10 minutes and has night hours, which is more convenient than taking your kids out of school, losing work time, and then having to watch them the rest of the day.
2. He does know a lot, but also, the office is mismanaged. Urgent care was created because doctors caused the experience to be dreadful. You wait hours for an appointment and then get maybe 2 minutes of the doctor’s time.
3. A Respectful Perspective on Modern Healthcare
I would first like to thank Dr. Shanik and Dr. Haimowitz for their years of service to our community. Their dedication to patients has earned the respect of countless families, including my own. During a difficult hospitalization away from home, they provided support and guidance that I will never forget.
While I appreciate many of the concerns raised in their article, I would like to offer a perspective from my experience in telehealth and urgent care.
Telehealth is not intended to replace primary care. It is an additional tool that expands access to care while recognizing its limits. For example, modern digital otoscopes allow providers to directly visualize the ear through high-quality images and video. When visibility is inadequate or uncertainty exists, patients are referred for in-person evaluation.
I also agree that continuity of care is important. However, providers routinely obtain detailed histories, and recurring conditions are often identified through careful questioning and review. The larger challenge is not where patients are seen, but how well information is shared between healthcare systems.
Most importantly, telehealth improves access. Families can receive timely medical guidance from home, avoid unnecessary delays, and be directed to higher levels of care when needed. I have personally seen telehealth encounters identify serious conditions that led to urgent referrals and timely treatment.
Primary care, urgent care, and telehealth are not competing models. They are complementary parts of the same healthcare system, each serving an important role in helping patients receive the care they need.
~ A provider involved in telehealth and urgent care systems
CBN – I think the bottom line is that, for sure in Lakewood and maybe in other communities as well, the old system isn’t working and can’t keep up with the population growth. It’s very challenging to get appointments, and when you do, it’s very often with a PA, the same level of experience that you would get at any urgent care.
The other glaring issue in Lakewood is that there is a huge lack of experienced physicians for adults (try being seen by Dr. Shoner and let me know how it goes🙈).
There is a huge need for urgent care and telehealth, and we don’t have much choice these days but to use them because of the lack of appointments, and my personal expericne using them has been good. The technology is here and we need it.
Bottom line: the medical field in the Lakewood area has to really step it up, we need more physicians, we need more specialist and we need proper facilities. There is no reason why we shouldn’t be building a cutting edge hospital here with a maternity ward and NICU etc… Its a bizayon that every time someone in Ocean County needs a specialist we have to travel hours to get to one.
It’s time🔥
