Posted on 10/12/2016 12:52:16 AM PDT by Brad from Tennessee
A few weeks ago, patients of Dr. Chad Savage received an alarming email.
The Brighton, Michigan, primary care physician told them that because of skyrocketing medical costs such as “expensive medications, crushing doctor bills and double digit insurance premium increases,” he would have to raise his own office rates. By…. $0.
“Yup! That’s right. Nothing! Zero, nada, zip,” his note said.
As a direct primary care (DPC) physician, Savage — not insurance companies or government regulators — sets his own rates. His patients pay a monthly fee for unlimited access to office visits and free in-office testing and procedures. And getting rid of the middleman cuts patient costs as much as 50 percent.
Savage told Watchdog.org he adopted the DPC model after 12 years of traditional practice so he could focus on his patients instead of bureaucracy.
“I wanted to work in a system that facilitated being a quality physician, instead of one in which you had to fight against the system to be a quality physician. Direct primary care allows me to do this,” he said. . .
(Excerpt) Read more at watchdog.org ...
Plus you are going to pay Uncle Sam your fine for not having insurance.
flr
bmp
If direct primary care caught on insures might offer a primary care supplement which when combined with savings from direct primary care might make financial sense for some customers. As you say, this may be a good start.
That’s what stop loss coverage is for. Most companies who have their own plans purchase it.
I don’t think that would work under ObamaCare
Any insurance sold in the US has to meet the requirements of The ACA.
Direct Care is a contract between the Doctor and the Patient. The only thing that would work with this is a direct contract between a patient and a hospital.
Such a deal would take us back to the first employer supplied medical coverage where the employer contracted with doctor and hospital to provide all of their employees with whatever medical care the company’s employees needed.
The employees had to go to the company’s doctor and hospital.
The employees had to go to the company’s doctor and hospital.
I think the vast majority of people would agree to do that.
We have a choice in our town of several hospitals but they are all owned by the same company..So we in effect do that now.
I feel sure the system set up this way would allow for the patient to choose from a list of doctors, pretty much like we used to do.
Hopefully, Trump is elected that the ACA bs becomes a bad memory....
My hope as well. But the Democrats would never give up the prize they have worked for since Wilson without a bloody battle that the Republicans would never fight.
Even if the Republicans had a veto proof majority in both houses with a nominal Republican President Trump in the White House I don’t see the Republicans going down to the wire with the Democrats to literally repeal ObamaCare. They just would be afraid of losing seats the next election.
Just too many cowards on the Republican side. The Democrats will fight long and dirty to get what they want. The Republicans just want to keep what they have; their seat.
Truth is, most folks would do better to pay cash for the small stuff. Office visits, prescriptions. Most testing is over utilized. You don’t need an MRI for every back pain.
If you should get a serious illness, harsh as it sounds, you and your family should decide if the proposed benefit is worth the cost. That is why it is called a catastrophe. Again, this is not the way I was trained but when do we ask how we ever got to the point that what we have now is appropriate. How is it that a doctor can sit in a room with a patient and their family AND DECIDE HOW THEY ARE GOING TO SPEND OTHER PEOPLE’S MONEY?
Outside of gummint I can’t think of another segment of society where two groups get to decide how to utilize the resources of a third without their knowledge. One could make the case that previously, by buying insurance, one was participating but with the gummint/insurance coalition conspiring to destroy family’s budgets with astronomical costs FOR insurance and deductibles that are ridiculous that case has been pretty well devastated.
Thirty years ago malpractice insurance began exploding and some doctors responded by “going bare”. Patients might want to consider this option in these times and a “free” people might feel they have the right. Yeah, there is risk. If you get an aggressive leukemia you will die unless you are very wealthy and willing to crush your family financially. OTOH, insurance companies would not take too long to respond to this pressure against their business model. Unless they are willing to become extinct.
Perhaps a better model would be “tribal” in any case. Not insurance, but group membership. Shared costs among members of a group who share beliefs or characteristics. Voluntarily embraced. Say, abstention from ethanol or homosexuality. Monogamists. Marathoners. I can think of a number of parameters for membership that would be considered to be relatively healthy. Shouldn’t “being healthy” be encouraged? What better way? Who knows, maybe even a diabetic group to pool market force and get better prices.
In any case, the time has come for some “out of the box” thinking because the socialists have ONE answer, we know what it is, AND NO ONE WANTS IT.
I’m not sure that insurance companies are allowed to offer a policy that competes with Obamacare.
My brother is a teamster. They have their own dentists,doctors and their own facilities.....I joined a doctors “group” in Augusta Maine that take no insurances NONE and they post prices of every service beforehand so you know what your dealing with. The savings from not having to file all of the bull s__t paperwork exactly coded and not having to deal with multiple providers saves tens of thousands alone....anything government touches creates a mountain of “make work” tasks that are not needed and couple that with smothering regulations and you have hangers on employed who suck off the tax payer and enjoy wages and benefits that they would never reach in the private sector. It is not the governments responsibility to provide health care....how in the world did past generations live into their 80’s.90’s and even 100’s without such money sucking from a filthy corrupt government?
How is that supposed to work without government intervention?/s
According to the article, most DPC plans recommend pairing with a catastrophic coverage health insurance. The two combined meet the requirements so avoid the fine.
Also, it says that in-office tests are included. Depending on the doctor, that could include at least x-Rays. I went to a chiropractor once who did his own X-Rays in-house. If it was not just a single doctor, but a medical group of a dozen doctors, the cost of having their own MRI and full lab would be spread across 10,000 total patients all paying their $50/mo.
I would have liked to see the article actually give the monthly cost he is charging his patients. He has 500 and is going to limit himself to 800 patients total — compared to the 3,500 he had when he had to bill Medicaid for everything. If he was charging $50/mo each, that would be $300K/yr now and $480K if he gets his 800 goal. If he has a medical assistant and lab tech on staff, that might be pretty close to accurate. If he is a one-man show taking vitals and drawing blood and testing everything himself, it might even be less than $50/mo. With only 800 patients, he is allowing himself an HOUR for each office visit, so I imagine he actually has quite a bit of idle time. I can’t remember the last time my primary care doctor spent more than 15 minutes with me.
This seems like a good model to me — no half dozen “insurance billing coordinators” adding overhead costs. When you go to the doctor you spend the time with him, not a few minutes with him and more time with a nurse and billing staff.
I believe you and Pontiac are addressing in Network Health Care, which the Network folks like and “the people” generally do not, especially when their doc, or facility, are not in the “Network” their insurance covers or they live miles from the in Network facility and doctor and prefer the other Network for convenience or what ever reason even though their insurance only covers “the Network”.
Networks are built on negotiations and contracts and so Networks take it seriously when the people themselves want to have what is called out of Network service. It is somewhat of an insurance issue than an affordable care issue, but between the two issues the people are the ones having to deal with insurance that doesn’t necessarily meet their daily or individual needs, and isn’t very flexible.
Concierge physician?
My cousin in DC has one, b/c she is self-employed. Fortunately, she is a healthy person. She loves the doc, and his service.
This practice, in Kansas was interviewed on a radio show. Makes sense to me.
http://www.kansas.com/news/business/health-care/article1077619.html
This is the concierge concept. It will work until the govt outlaws it. If Hillary is elected this guy will have at best three years
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