Risky urgent care provider behavior increased in 2025, Chatmeter analysis finds

Review of provider responses to online reviews also found up to 46% contained potential HIPAA violations

SAN DIEGO, June 24, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- References to risky provider behavior were up 13% year-over-year in patient reviews of the largest urgent care facilities across the United States, Chatmeter's 2025 Urgent Care Patient Experience Report found.

The report, based on an AI-powered analysis of 350,000 patient reviews from ten of the nation's largest urgent care providers, found that allegations of improper care increased 6.5%, with the word "misdiagnosed" appearing 18% more often and reviews mentioning that a provider "didn't listen" rising by 10% in 2025 compared to 2024.

"Urgent care is one of the fastest growing healthcare segments, but these findings underscore how critical it is that providers listen carefully to patient feedback as they expand," said John Mazur, CEO of Chatmeter, a multi-location intelligence platform. "Business risks are often hidden within the billions of data points generated by online chatter. But with AI, urgent care providers can analyze that patient feedback at scale, spot emerging risks, and take early corrective action to offer a better patient experience."

Additional Key Findings:

• Digital engagement rose, with patient reviews mentioning app usage up 33% and sentiment around websites rising by 7.5%. However, providers must remain vigilant when engaging patients digitally. Chatmeter's Pulse Ai: Compliance Officer found that almost half (46%) of provider responses to online reviews contained potential HIPAA violations, most commonly by acknowledging patients received care or using patient names in public replies.
• Wait times remained a top patient complaint, mentioned in 27% of reviews. While sentiment around wait times improved by nearly 2% and mentions decreased by 5%, the lack of communication regarding expected wait times continued to frustrate patients, with many stating that online appointments were not honored.
• Billing and insurance issues improved slightly, with sentiment up 1% and mentions down nearly 3%, but still generated significant dissatisfaction due to inaccurate bills, unclear charges and poor communication.
• Patients appreciated the medical staff, mentioning them in 13% of reviews, most being positive. But sentiment in reviews related to non-urgent appointments, such as for vaccines or physical exams, declined by nearly 4%. Mentions of doctors declined by almost 5%, while mentions of nurse practitioners increased by around 12% and mentions of physician assistants rose nearly 3%.

The report analyzed patient reviews from June 1, 2023 to May 31, 2025 across major urgent care providers, including AFC Urgent Care, City MD, Concentra Urgent Care, GoHealth Urgent Care, Prisma Health Urgent Care, NextCare Urgent Care, Fast Pace Health Urgent Care, WellNow Urgent Care and Physicians Immediate Care.

Download the full report here.

About Chatmeter
Chatmeter is a groundbreaking intelligence platform purpose-built to help multi-location businesses turn customer feedback into actionable insights and search rankings into real revenue. Using generative AI and other proprietary AI models, the Chatmeter platform analyzes millions of customer interactions across reviews, surveys, images and social media to help the world's largest businesses understand what customers really care about, what their real business risks are, how to compete in local markets and more.

SOURCE Chatmeter