vidalia &8212;The

after-hours clinic at Riverpark Medical Center is barely three months old, but it is growing up fast.

The clinic is the brainchild of Dr. Ibrahim Seki and Dr. Randy Tillman; they thought there was a market for urgent care &8212; especially after hours &8212; in the Miss-Lou. And they were right.

The customer demand has risen and the clinic has tried to grown with it. Seki has added another doctor, Irina Gordey and opened the clinic seven days a week from 3-11 p.m.

Urgent care is for cases that need medical assistance but not necessarily emergency room assistance.

Basically, if it&8217;s not serious enough to get you to the head of the ER line, you probably will have a shorter wait at an urgent care clinic.

And if the condition is more serious than a clinic visit, Seki said he can admit people straight into a hospital room without the emergency room visit.

It took a little while, but the concept caught on.

&8220;We saw eight patients our first day and one the second,&8221; Seki said. &8220;Yesterday we saw 40.&8221;

It&8217;s busy, in other words, but not too busy.

&8220;Speed is our motto,&8221; he said. &8220;I had a woman come in here and tell me I almost caused her a divorce.&8221;

The woman in question returned home so quickly after taking their kids to the clinic that she had to show her husband the prescriptions to prove her story.

A new feature to the clinic is a laboratory &8212; along with two lab technicians &8212; that enables Seki to get many basic test results in a matter of minutes.

The clinic is also available for preventative care including mammograms, pap smears, colonoscopies as well as the old fashioned checkup.

The clinic also fills prescriptions, which has been especially helpful to the evacuee population.

&8220;Normally, they don&8217;t have anything wrong with them, they just ran out of their prescription. We examine them and give them a new one.&8221;

Two medical assistants handle the traffic and paperwork. Seki said they would hire a registered nurse if the demand continues to grow.

The clinic takes all forms of insurance from Louisiana and Mississippi, including Medicare and Medicaid, and sets up payment plans for those who cannot otherwise afford to pay.

Seki advised that 3-6 p.m. are the busiest hours and later in the evening gets much less traffic.