What Is Acute Medical Care?

Acute medical care in medical community language is used to differentiate from chronic medical care. Acute typically means of short duration, although "short" by a layman's standards and "short" by medical standards may stand worlds apart.

Definition

• Acute medical care is synonymous with short-term medical care. Generally, this is a condition or treatment that will have a short course and then be healed, managed or completed.

Examples

• Treatment at a hospital is acute care, as is the treatment provided in a emergency room. Treatment in the emergency room can also be urgent care, depending on the reason for the visit; if the condition for which you are being seen is potentially life-threatening, it would be considered both acute and urgent care that is required.

  Acute medical care may be provided for conditions ranging from influenza to a hip fracture to surgical removal of an organ. Acute medical care may also be provided for an exacerbation of a chronic illness or condition, such as pneumonia in a person with chronic obstructive lung disease (COPD).

Function

• The function of acute medical care is to treat the presenting condition or illness and return the person to his state of health prior to the episode.

Types

• Physician's office: When you make an appointment to see your physician for symptoms you may be having such as a rash, fever, nausea, vomiting or shortness of breath, the treatment the physician provides is considered to be acute medical care.

  Not all the conditions or problems for which you see a physician are for acute (short-term) issues. Having regular blood pressure check-ups when you have hypertension is treatment for a chronic condition.

  Hospitals: Many of the services provided by the hospital are considered to be acute medical care. Even a prolonged stay in the hospital for a psychiatric illness or treatment of extensive burns would be considered acute medical care. Surgery falls under the description of acute medical care, as do departments such as orthopedics.

  Units such as a kidney dialysis unit, where patients come many times weekly to receive their dialysis treatment also fall under the heading of acute medical care, even though that care is given on a repeating basis for a long period of time.

  Urgent care facilities: These types of facilities are set-up and equipped to deal with only acute medical care.

  Long-term care facilities: Although at first it may seem that long-term care facilities such as nursing homes and rehabilitation units would not fall under the heading of providing acute medical care, many such facilities do provide such care. People who have sustained multiple injuries or extensive trauma or have suffered a stroke often need longer term treatment for their conditions. This treatment may include physical, occupational or speech therapies so they can return to their independent daily lives.

Misconceptions

• Acute, meaning short-term, is a relative concept. To some, short term might indicate medical care that is done in the span of time in a physician's office visit. To others, short term might indicate a hospital stay of a few days. Acute medical care, as the term is used in the medical community, has been defined by medical standards.