The Wall-Street Journal Online has an interesting post on how the AMA is fighting the rise of retail healthcare (hat tip: Kevin, M.D.).

The main alarms being raised by docs right now concern 1) facility standards, 2) quality of care, and 3) the chance that such clinics could become hostings agents for communicable diseases.

Physician groups, including the American Medical Association, contend that the in-store clinics increase the risks of infection for both patients and shoppers. They also question the quality of their care, noting that most are staffed by nurse practitioners instead of doctors...Another issue is space. The current regulations in Massachusetts require that rooms where patients are treated include at least 80 square feet of floor space and an exam table. MinuteClinics have no exam table -- patients are treated in chairs -- and at most 54 square feet of floor space.

But is this all about physician altruism and 'doing no harm' or is it about money, power, prestige and control of America's largest service sector? WSJOnline continues...

Retail clinics argue that the safety concerns raised by groups like the AMA are overblown and motivated by financial concerns. After all, they point out, primary-care physicians stand to lose business if patients with minor ailments head to CVS instead of their regular doctors.

Why does this matter to state legislators? Because 1) retail health is on a rapid rise and coming to a state near you, 2) licensure laws and public health regulations are the top competitive threats to this fresh health care delivery approach and 3) state leaders could win points for policy innovation by following Gov. Rendell's (D-Penn.) lead in putting retail health alongside more traditional issues like public insurance and EMR adoption as a pillar of good state health care reform.