Patients suffering from serious health conditions that need quick treatment during off-hours often find themselves in a predicament. How do they get the most effective care for their condition in the shortest amount of time?

People often think the best course of action for a serious or uncomfortable medical situation is to go the emergency room. They think a trip to the ER will ensure them quality medical care with only a reasonably long wait.

However, what many patients don’t realize is that a trip to the ER for something not severely critical or life-threatening can be a waste of money, as well as time, for both the patient and the ER staff. A better option for people suffering from serious but non-life-threatening illnesses or injuries is an urgent care clinic — an around-the-clock medical care center that takes patients as walk-ins without appointments.

Almost all urgent care centers have both physicians and physician's assistants on staff, and they have a wide range of medical equipment — including X-rays, lab tests, EKG machines and more. Doctors at urgent care centers can write prescriptions, and they can also stitch up cuts and set broken bones.

So what if a patient were to ask you — urgent care or ER?

There are some basic facts you should know to help determine the right course of care quickly. Anyone experiencing chest pains, debilitating headaches or stroke symptoms should definitely, without question, head to the ER.

Patients sometimes make the mistake of going to an urgent care clinic when they are suffering from a serious condition because they think the wait time will be shorter, and that, in turn, they will be seen quicker.

This is not the case, however, because all an urgent care provider will do is call an ambulance to get the sufferer to an ER right away — ultimately delaying treatment. Therefore, you should always encourage patients to go straight to the ER if they think that they are suffering from something that might end up being life-threatening.

So when do you encourage someone to go to an urgent care center? As an ER doctor or nurse, it’s against your instinct to turn away patients, but sometimes directing people to an urgent care center will benefit not only them but the rest of your hospital staff and other people waiting to be treated at the ER.

Here are some things to keep in mind when determining whether a patient is best treated at an ER or an urgent care center.

First, patients should always choose to see an urgent care doctor if they are suffering from something their regular family doctor would treat. Examples of these conditions include flus, colds, sore throats, stomach viruses, severe coughs, urinary tract infections and other mild illnesses.

Other conditions that might seem more severe than what a family doctor normally treats but is still best treated at an urgent care center include mild allergic reactions, animal bites, mild asthma attacks, rashes or skin conditions that cause discomfort.

Finally, a common mistake people make is coming to the ER when they fear they have broken a bone. Nearly all urgent care centers are equipped with X-ray equipment, and urgent care doctors are trained to X-ray an injury, identify a break, set a bone and instruct a patient on the proper course of action.

While not equipped to perform surgery to treat a more severe break, an urgent care doctor can determine the severity of your break quickly and eliminate a lengthy wait in an ER.