Concierge Medicine Association

Concierge medicine goes by many names, boutique medicine, retainer medicine, executive health, VIP medicine, and personalized medicine. By any name, concierge medicine is the solution for doctors trying to maintain their integrity and independence in today’s difficult healthcare environment. Concierge medicine is a new style of practice with old roots, in which doctors limit their patient base in order to provide patients with personalized service, high quality care, 24-7 availability, and other amenities. In exchange for this enhanced personal attention, patients pay physicians an annual fee. This concierge fee enables physicians to increase their compensation while managing their workload. In addition to receiving an annual fee, most concierge physicians continue to receive reimbursements from health plans and private pay clients.

Relationship

Concierge medicine is a relationship between a patient and a primary care physician in which the patient pays an annual fee or retainer. This may or may not be in addition to other charges. In exchange for the retainer, doctors provide enhanced care. Other terms in use include boutique medicine, retainer-based medicine, and innovative medical practice design.The practice is also referred to as membership medicine, concierge health care, cash only practice, direct care, direct primary care, and direct practice medicine. While all concierge medicine practices share similarities, they vary widely in their structure, payment requirements, and form of operation. In particular, they differ in the level of service provided and the amount of the fee charged. There are an estimated 5,000 concierge, or membership medicine doctors throughout the U.S. Concierge physicians care for fewer patients than in a conventional practice. All generally claim to be accessible via cell phone or email at any time of day or night or offer some other special service beyond the normal care provided. The annual fees vary widely, from $600 to $5,000 per year for an individual, with the lower annual fees being in addition to the usual fees for each service and the higher annual fees including most services.

Some concierge practices do not accept insurance of any kind. These are as cash-only or direct primary care practices. By refusing to deal with insurance companies, these practices can keep overhead and administrative costs low, thereby providing affordable healthcare to patients. They become concierge only if the practice assesses an annual or monthly fee instead of or in addition to a fee for each medical service. Other concierge practices do take insurance, even Medicare, but ask for an annual fee for additional services exclusive of insurance plans. This annual fee is not a substitute for medical insurance, and generally does not cover consultations outside the practice, laboratory procedures, medicines, hospitalizations, or emergency care from other providers.

Direct Primary Care

Direct primary care is primary care offered direct to the consumer, without insurance intervention. It incorporates various health care delivery systems that involve direct financial relationships between patients and health care providers. One niche variant of direct primary care is concierge medicine. Direct primary care can remove many of the financial barriers to accessing care when needed. Often, there are no insurance co-pays, deductibles or co-insurance fees thus avoiding the overhead and complexity of maintaining relationships with insurers.

House Call MD

A house call MD, or Physician house call, is an act of customer service where the doctors goes to the consumers home, rather than the consumer visiting the suppliers place of business. House calls are most often associated with doctor house calls. There are still doctors making house calls. A physician-led multidisciplinary team provides comprehensive, patient-centered care for any condition, from the simple problems to the very complex, in the patient’s own environment. Thanks to modern technology and our sophisticated, multi-faceted delivery system, we can do more tests and procedures in our patient’s home or place of business than other primary care physicians do in their office. House call MDs are equipped to perform most procedures normally performed in a medical office. House call doctors utilize electronic medical records and will coordinate home health and hospice services, mobile imaging services, durable medical equipment services, laboratory services, and specialist referral services. House call doctors acts as the primary care physician or as augmentation to or as an interim physician to the patients’ present medial team. Doctor’s House calls provide post hospital stabilization service to physicians, insurance plans, and hospitals to mitigate hospital re-admissions.