Direct Primary CAre

After many years of seeing patients in a large hospital system, I learned about Direct Primary Care.  I loved taking care of my patients, but I was increasingly frustrated with things I could not control: call center wait times, three months until the next available appointment, hidden charges patients would get long after their visit ended, speeding through visits to get to the next appointment.  I learned that DPC could solve all of those problems.

Direct Primary Care is an alternative to insurance-driven healthcare where your doctor is empowered to help assess your health needs without the burden of overwhelming insurance company bureaucracy.  DPC allows your doctor to take care of you with the best of their medical knowledge and not just whatever can be crammed into a 10 minute visit.  In DPC, patients pay a flat membership fee (monthly or annually) to be in the practice.  Members pay nothing for office visits, whether for preventive services, chronic disease management, or evaluation of new problems.  No co-pays for portal messages or phone calls.  Just make the appointment and address all your needs.  Membership panel sizes are limited to ensure that all patients can be seen within one or two business days, and often the same day as the call!  Sometimes extra services like procedures may have additional costs, but all of these prices will be listed ahead of time and will be set much lower than the big system-based practices would charge if you had a deductible.

It is also important to understand that we do not consider this concierge.  Concierge practices charge much higher memberships and STILL bill your insurance and collect co-pays.  You may still see unexpectedly high charges for some services.  But a concierge doctor might come in on nights and weekends for that high fee.  In DPC, my goal is to create a membership price that is not exorbitant and is reasonable for the majority of patients in our communities.  Members have no co-pays for visits and will usually be able to schedule same day, or at most within 1-2 business days.  These visits are with your own doctor, not a random provider from the big group.  Appointments are during normal business hours.  While doctors are available for emergencies 24/7, our goal is to have patients call for non-urgent questions during the daytime.   

If you are interested in joining the practice, we would love to schedule a free discussion about how our practice may best fit your healthcare needs.

For more information about DPC, check out https://dpcnation.org/