Dr. Bruce Irwin opened the first American Family Care® in 1982, making it the first urgent care, family care, and primary care practice in Birmingham, Alabama. As a child, Dr. Irwin frequently watched doctors attend to his father’s medical needs. During frequent trips to the emergency room, Dr. Irwin noticed that many non-emergency patients were taking up time and resources from the ER, making the experience more difficult for themselves and those in need of true life-saving care. It was during this time he came up with his idea for an urgent care network that could attend to the needs of non-emergency patients who were in need of immediate attention.

From the outset, Dr. Irwin held to the philosophy of “putting the patient first,” an attitude that quickly made AFC one of the most successful urgent care clinics in the area. More than 35 years later, the AFC brand and philosophy have spread to more than 200 facilities across 26 states, treating nearly three million patients a year. We are proud to stand as one of the most widely-known and admired brands in healthcare and anticipate having more than 500 clinics nationwide in the next five years.