What is the difference between an acute care facility and non-acute care facility?

Answer 1

"Acute care is a branch of secondary health care where a patient receives active but short-term treatment for a severe injury or episode of illness, an urgent medical condition, or during recovery from surgery. In medical terms, care for acute health conditions is the opposite from chronic care, or longer term care." (Wikipedia) Practically speaking, the term "non-acute" includes ambulatory and outpatient clinics, dialysis centers, rehabilitation facilities, home health, schools, prisons, physicians' offices, long-term care facilities, and assisted living environments. In non-acute settings, Physician assistants and/or registered nurses are allotted greater freedom to make independent decisions in patient care do to the fact that physicians are often not immediately available for consultation. Non-acute care facilities are more likely to employ "mobile health care providers" (e.g. traveling nurses, radiologic technologist, etc.) to meet fluctuating demand for their services. On the plus side, full time employees of non-acute care facilities are better able to develop a strong bond with their clients, and follow their treatment on an out patient basis, than are their "acute care" counterparts.