Will the public really care about fragmentation of care, or will they think that convenience takes priority?

Not that many are convinced this trend is good for patients. Within the past six months, the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics have both decried it.

“Convenience is not enough,” the AMA lamented in a recent editorial. Comparing the mini-clinic phenomenon to kudzu — the tree-strangling vine rampant in the South — the AMA complained these new services are spreading too far, too fast. In a policy statement issued this fall, the AAP “opposes retail-based clinics as an appropriate source of medical care for infants, children, and adolescents and strongly discourages their use.”

As traditional medicine sees it, when a young patient gets hurry-up treatment for a single symptom at a retail-based clinic (RBC), also known as a convenient care clinic (CCC), the process leads to “fragmentation of care.”