TELEMEDICINE & CHANGES IN ACUTE CARE CLINIC HOURS

Virginia Pediatric and Adolescent Center is pleased to announce that we have extended our walk-in acute care clinic hours of operation to better suit the needs of our patients. We also offer telemedicine for certain visit types. 

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Hours of Operation in Both Springfield and Fair Ridge Offices:

Scheduled Appointments: 7:00 AM – 4:45 PM

Walk-in Acute Care Clinic: 7:00 AM – 11:30AM and 1:00 PM – 4:30PM

Saturday Walk-in Acute Care Clinic (Fair Ridge Only): 9:00 AM – 11:30 AM

With changing work, home and school scheduling demands brought on by this pandemic, family schedules may be quite variable from day to day. We have therefore elected to move to an all-day walk in clinic from 7:00 AM – 4:30 PM with a 90 minute break from 11:30 AM – 1:00 PM in both offices. Our goal is to spread out and space the flow of our patients in order to allow a safer office environment. There will be no ill patients waiting in the waiting room, wait times will be minimized, and we will bring patients directly back to the rooms. The walk-in patients will be seen in only a few designated rooms by a provider who is seeing only acute care patients. We will continue to see well visits and conferences by appointment only.

If you are bringing a child in for acute care clinic (weekdays and Saturday), we ask you to call us from your car when you arrive and to follow the prompts for “Walk-in Clinic”. Your call will be answered by a nurse, and they will either have you come right in or call you back when a room is available.

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Please note that we offer acute and antibody testing for COVID-19 during our walk-in clinic hours. 

The current turn-around time for COVID PCR testing is 2-5 business days. Provider discretion is used to determine the proper testing modality (rapid antigen vs PCR send-out)  based on a patient's presentation. We do not offer rapid testing for asymptomatic patients. 

We continue to require that ALL patients and family members 2 years and older wear masks at all times while in our office, just as our staff does. We also request that patients come with only one parent (the other parent will need to wait in the car unless the patient is 2 months or younger) and avoid bringing siblings unless they are being seen that day. We continue to strictly adhere to thorough cleaning/disinfecting of all patient rooms between patients (well and sick).

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Please note that we no longer offer walk-in strep testing. Due to the availability of our morning and afternoon acute care clinic hours on weekdays, and because a sore throat may need further evaluation than a strep swab during the COVID-19 pandemic, we instead ask that patients come in during acute-care clinic hours to be examined by a provider and be tested for strep and/or other illnesses as deemed appropriate.

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Telemedicine visits are available in most cases for the following types of visits:

• conferences involving ADHD

• social/emotional and behavioral health

• some minor illnesses

There may be some situations for which we will still recommend an in-person visit.  We will continue to advise patients to come in for concerns such as strep throat, ear infections, urinary tract infections, fevers in patients below a certain age or any illness for which we feel an in-person examination or lab work to be necessary to make a proper diagnosis and treatment plan. 

• If a telemedicine appointment is felt to be appropriate, you will be given an appointment time with a specific provider and a link for the appointment by email.

• Telemedicine appointments are HIPAA compliant.

• If possible, it is best for you to use a computer rather than a phone so that the provider can see both you and your child.

• The visit will be billed to your insurance company.

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Please continue to social distance and follow good hygiene practices.  Also, please understand that the coronavirus outbreak is an ever-evolving situation, and we will need to continue to change our schedule as the pandemic changes.  We thank you in advance for your flexibility and patience.