Impact of a Cancer Urgent Care Clinic on Regional Emergency Department Visits

PURPOSE:Did the creation of an urgent care clinic specifically for patients with cancer affect emergency department visits among adults newly diagnosed with cancer?PATIENTS AND METHODS:We applied an interrupted time series analysis to adjusted monthly emergency department visits made by adults age 18 years or older who were diagnosed with cancer between 2009 and 2016 at a comprehensive cancer center. Cancer registry patients were linked to a longitudinal regional database of emergency department and hospital visits. Because the urgent care clinic was closed on weekends, we took advantage of the natural experiment by comparing weekend visits as a control group. Our primary outcome was emergency department visits within 180 days after a cancer diagnosis, compiled as adjusted monthly rates of emergency department visits per 1,000 patient-months. We analyzed subsequent hospitalizations as a secondary outcome.RESULTS:The rate of weekday emergency department visits was increasing at a rate of 0.43 visits (95% C...