What Is a Wellness Center?
Types of Wellness Centers
Wellness can mean different things to different people, and the wide variety of wellness centers available reflects that. In the broadest sense, wellness center is used to describe establishments that offer health services for both the mind and the body using science, technology, or natural treatments. Wellness centers typically fall into one of three categories.
General health and wellness centers – These types of wellness centers provide general health and wellness services that help patients thrive in their environments. These wellness centers often have a health clinic, a nutrition clinic, and therapists on staff and can often be found within large corporations or on college campuses.
Physician-run wellness centers – Another common type of wellness center is the type run by a group of physicians or medical specialists. Physician-run wellness centers often focus on drug rehabilitation, physical therapy, psychiatric care, or general health care.
Wellness centers offering specific services – The most common types of wellness centers are those that offer specific services of a specialized nature. These centers can be found anywhere and can offer anything from cosmetic surgery to holistic medicine. The common thread is that they all provide services that are supposed to improve physical or mental wellness.
Common Reasons for Visiting Wellness Centers
Holistic medicine – There are many wellness centers available that take a holistic approach to medicine, which is attractive to those seeking natural methods of maintaining their health.
Skin care services – These types of services include treatments for acne, aging skin, burns, cold sores, corns and calluses, hair loss, moles and birthmarks, rashes, skin infections, scars, and warts.
Fitness services – Common fitness services offered by wellness centers include personal training services, group exercise classes, and nutrition consulting.
Chiropractic services – Wellness centers that specialize in chiropractic services offer a wide variety of treatments, including spinal adjustments, therapeutic exercises, soft tissue manual therapy, nerve and muscle stimulation, and ultrasound diagnostics.
Medical weight loss services – Wellness centers offering medical weight loss services provide prescription weight loss solutions, surgical weight loss solutions, meal-planning and nutrition services, and follow-up care.
Laser skin treatment services – There is a wide array of laser skin treatment services available, including tattoo removal, hair removal, services to rejuvenate aged or sagging skin, and treatments to minimize the appearance of wrinkles, varicose veins, scars, and age spots
Benefits of Visiting a Wellness Center
Wellness centers are designed to target physical and mental health care needs that are not vital, but are important to maintaining health. The atmosphere at wellness centers is more relaxed than at other types of health care facilities because they are not dealing with medical issues that are urgent or require emergency intervention. Instead, these facilities are focused more on helping patients establish healthy habits and treating minor or irritating medical conditions.
Wellness center staff members that are providing medical services are required to have the same medical licenses as other medical service providers and are subject to the same stringent regulations. Wellness centers that provide non-medical and holistic services may also be required to hold specific licenses, depending on the state that they are based in.
How To Choose the Best Wellness Centers
With the term "wellness center" covering such a wide array of businesses, it is important to know what services are being provided and the education and experience of the people providing the services. Most wellness centers are very transparent about who they are and what they do, and if they are not, that can be a red flag that they are not who they are claiming to be.
Do your research and ask others that have used the wellness center what they think about their services. Searching for reviews on the internet can also help you determine the reputation of the wellness center. As more people decide to bolster their health through wellness services, the information available about the services and the wellness centers that offer them will only get better.
