Concierge Medicine

It is well-known that the American healthcare system is overburdened and broken. There is little chance that this system will be fixed in the foreseeable future. The concierge model finally allows us to practice medicine the way we believe medicine should be practiced. We believe that each patient encounter should be at least 30 to 60 minutes long. Typically, we will have to review detailed records including consultant notes, labs, radiology reports, medications, allergies and that is before we even start speaking to our patients. The more time we spent talking to our patients, the more we learn about what their goals and desires truly are. Every person has different expectations for their health. We have patients who are professional body builders. Conversely, we have patients who are sedentary but want the motivation to make a change in their life. We have patients with strong family histories of serious medical illnesses who want to do everything possible to avoid the same fate. All of these people require our full-time and attention during each and every encounter.

Patients have come to expect a high level of service from this practice. Patients have always been given a significant amount of our knowledge and attention to detail. We provide services in this practice that are not typically provided by most primary care practitioners. We believe that the single best thing we can offer our patients is our time.

We are very passionate about the practice of medicine. We enjoy what we do. Unfortunately, if we were to spend 80+ hours a week, every single week on minutia and paperwork, we would be likely to burnout in a few years. By reducing the number of patients in our practice to a reasonable volume, we can spend more time practicing medicine and less time catering to the whims of the insurance companies.

Our goal is to expand on the protocols that we have created. We believe that we are just starting our journey of exploration to optimize the health of our patients. We believe that there are many aspects of functional medicine, alternative medicine, and holistic medicine to be learned and incorporated into our practice. We plan to continue with screening patients for potential clinical trials. We plan to learn more about peptides and other alternative treatment options.

At HMS CCPHP we believe that everyone is unique and needs to be treated on an individual basis not as a clinical disease state. We have spent years developing the protocols that we use in our practice. Many people have heard of the 4 pillars of health. We have expanded on those to create the 8 fundamentals of wellness. These 8 parameters are what we target at each and every visit. They include exercise, nutrition, sleep, stress management, hormone optimization, brain protection, genetics, and creating healthy social interactions. If you notice the things that are missing from that list, they are the highlights that most other practices focus on such as blood pressure, cholesterol, blood sugar, weight, mental health, and cancer. We believe that by building a strong foundation to support the 8 fundamentals of wellness, we are able to alleviate, and in many cases eliminate many comorbid conditions.

As far as insurance plans that we excepted our practice, nothing will change. We will still run office visits, labs, and most of your prescription medications through your insurance. We recommend all patients keep their insurance policies active as the concierge model is not a substitute for traditional health insurance. As always, we will always do our best to make sure that the labs we run are covered by your insurance to the best of our ability. Our goal is to limit the amount of money our patients spend on diagnostic testing, medications, and hospitalizations. We truly believe that in the long run, the concierge model will actually end up saving money for patients, insurance companies, and the entire healthcare system as a whole.

Our office will not change in any way. CC PHP will help this facilitate the administrative duties of the concierge practice but they were not in no way be involved in medical management or how we run our practice. Our practice will continue to provide the same care we have provided for years albeit with the luxury of being able to spend quality time with each and every individual patient.

Over the years we have formed a bond with every single one of the patients in our practice. Patients who choose not to continue with us under the concierge program will be missed and we will do our best to help them find a new primary care provider. Most patients will be able to continue to stay in this practice and be seen by our other PA Elizabeth Lizzy Elam, PA-C. We also have plans on hiring a new provider in the near future to handle some of the load. Patients need to keep in mind that due to time constraints, Lizzy will no longer be able to have extensive visits as we have been able to do in the past. Visits will be more problem focused and lab testing will need to be basic. This will be no different than what most of the other primary care practices provide in our area. Unfortunately, complex issues such as weight management, hormone replacement, peptide therapy, and gut health cannot be feasibly managed in this setting. For patients that still want to have those services but do not elect to join the concierge side, we can help you find a functional medicine provider that may be able to offer the services for you. Keep in mind that functional medicine providers rarely take insurance for office visits, medications, or testing.

Not at all. We believe that concierge medicine is for those that are the most invested in their health and wellbeing. It is a misconception that concierge medicine is primarily for the old and sick. Concierge medicine is designed for those patients that want the freedom to have medical care on their terms and not as dictated by insurance companies. We have several patients in our practice who we have given advice to, but they never take our advice. Those patients could be just as well served by seeing any other primary care provider. Concierge medicine is not for the patients that want to see their doctors multiple times a year. Rather, it is for the patients who know that when they actually need to see their doctor, they will be accommodated in a timely manner. We have been pleasantly surprised at the number of patients who have signed up to the concierge program a few days of us announcing the change. More surprisingly, with a number of patients that signed up who we typically only see once or twice a year. We noticed that these patients were some of the healthiest in our practice. We truly believe that the patients who stay healthy other ones value and make some sacrifices towards their goal of staying healthy.

We tried our best to make the annual concierge membership fee affordable for most of our patients. Patients need to choose how much value our contribution to their health and our commitment to doing everything possible to keep them healthy. The membership fee is not based on seniority or favoritism. If we are to limit our practice to around 600 patients, this is the amount that would make the running and management of the medical practice feasible. The truth is, financially it makes more sense to have a huge number of patients in our practice and spend less time with age patient. Ethically, we cannot practice medicine that way. We believe that with a huge volume of patients under our care, we run a higher risk of making mistakes, missing things, and generally just neglecting our patients healthcare. The patients who have been in this practice for more than 15 years should remember the days when we had fewer patients and we were able to spend much more time on patient care. The goal with going to the concierge model is to go back to that time period.

Nearly every doctor believes that they are the past. This probably stems from the competitive nature of medical training. I believe that there are many doctors who are smarter than I am. My strength comes from my understanding of how much I really do not know. I am always willing to learn, grow, and incorporate everything I learn into the wellbeing of my patients. We believe that many of you who have been our patients for the past few years know that we practice a different type of medicine than that of our peers. We are much less inclined to put our patients on medication. We believe in finding the underlying cause of why someone needs medication and try to fix that first. The lab tests that we order are more detailed than what most of our patients have ever had performed before. In fact, many of our patients have come to us because of the lab testing that we do. We offer therapies that most other physicians do not offer such as hormone pellets, peptides, body fat analysis, nutritional supplements, treating gut health, treating mental health, nutritional advice, exercise advice, preventive cardiology, and clinical trials. We are willing to incorporate traditional and nontraditional medicine under one umbrella. We know of no other medical practices that routinely monitor parameters of health such as IGF-I, LP(a), HRV, body fat percentage, basal metabolic rate, visceral fat levels, muscle mass, free T3, female testosterone levels, just to name a few. Our practice has also gained a reputation amongst other providers at being able to treat conditions that have been termed “difficult”. We regularly get patients who have been referred to us by their own primary care physicians because they know that we are able to offer alternative therapies and treatments. We are proud of the fact that amongst our patients are many local physicians, their families, and their friends.