PartnerMD On-Demand Webinar (50 minutes)
↧↧ See full transcript below ↧↧
What is concierge medicine? How does it work? What do you get from your membership? PartnerMD physician Dr. Eric Haacke-Golden and membership expert Melissa Gifford explain.
Get to know your doctor before you join during your free 30-minute video consultation with a PartnerMD physician in your area.
Fill out this brief form to get connected with a membership expert who can schedule your visit.
Why complete this form? Watch the video to learn more.
Get to know your doctor before you join during your free 30-minute video consultation with a PartnerMD physician in your area.
Fill out this brief form to get connected with a membership expert who can schedule your visit.
Why complete this form? Watch the video to learn more.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator: (00:41)
Hi everyone. I am Kristin Richardson with PartnerMD and we have Melissa Gifford is also going to be joining us in just a second. There she is. Hi Melissa. And we also have Dr. Eric Haacke-Golden. Who's going to be joining us today from our Richmond at Short Pump office, and he is wrapping up with a patient right now. He'll join us just as soon as he can. So it looks like he has joined us. Let me add him. Thanks for everyone's patience. Patient care always comes first. Dr. Haacke-Golden. Can you hear us?
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D.:
Yes, I am. Here I am. Can you hear me?
Kristin Richardson, Moderator: (01:01):
Let me see if I can get your video on. Welcome to technology. Awesome. We also have Melissa on, thank you everyone for joining. You've got a packed house today. Appreciate everyone taking the time to join us for our monthly webinar that we hold with a physician every month to help you understand the whole industry of concierge medicine, how PartnerMD approaches it, and whether it's a good fit for you. And now that we have Dr. Haacke-Golden, Melissa, I'll let you take it away.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (01:30):
Thank you, Kristin. Thanks for joining us, Dr. Haacke-Golden. We're so glad to have you today. Welcome to PartnerMD's "Understanding Concierge Medicine" this afternoon. I am Melissa Gifford and I am one of the membership and corporate development team at PartnerMD. And I have with me, Dr. Eric Haacke-Golden, one of our newer physicians at PartnerMD. And I'm going to ask him to right up front in the beginning, because having made that transition from traditional medicine to a concierge practice, Dr. Haacke-Golden, please tell us what the difference that you're experiencing is and how you treat your patients differently here than maybe you have in previous practices.
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (02:55):
It's an honor to be here. I have practiced in Richmond for 20 years and through that time have really strived to coordinate care and be as present with my patients as possible. And actually trying to do concierge medicine, I think, for people out in my community, not really even knowing concierge medicine existed, but the time factor is really what became hard for me. Having enough time to spend with my patients, having enough time to coordinate their care and just really be able to understand the complex individual that everybody is.
So moving here, I've been now at the office for a couple of months, and it's been really an awesome place to be able to just sort of expand into the doctor that I've wanted to be. Just having my last patient, that's why I was late to this meeting. We needed the time, and I was able to spend, you know, an hour honestly, with her because of her complex medical conditions and, and it needed that. I've never had that ability. And I think it's going to do better for her care. She was just as an example. So there's time and that ability just to connect with people on a one-on-one basis is really an amazing thing for a doctor, for sure. And I think for patients at the same time, absolutely.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (04:48):
Dr. Haacke-Golden, one of the physicians that I've worked with in Greenville told me something that has stuck with me. When I first started at PartnerMd, he said he learned in medical school that if you listen to your patients, they will tell you what is wrong with them. And to have the time to do that, I know, is just amazing.
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (05:08):
Yeah, absolutely. I think that I learned the same thing, and it is so true. Everybody out there has the words to express it. And if we are able just to sit back and listen, and knit that together, it really is true that, you guys, as patients, can tell us what's wrong if we're able to listen to you.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (05:31):
Thanks. So we have multiple new physicians at PartnerMD. One of the things we are very aware of is how many patients are in our doctor's patient panels. And we try to keep that at a certain number, but it may vary by physician. If a physician has an older patient panel that they see more often, they may take fewer patients than a doctor who has a patient panel or an executive patient panel that can not see their patients as often. So it depends on the doctor's patient panel. And like I said, we stay very aware of that, but we add additional doctors so that we make sure that we're always able to give you what we have promised as the amenities of the practice.
So helping us to achieve that is Dr. Haacke-Golden in Richmond. We have Dr. Fierro also in Richmond. Dr. Shafai has just joined us in McLean, and we're also adding Dr. Sherrard in Midlothian. So we are really happy to have these additions at PartnerMD and happy that we are growing and ... As a membership person, the largest number of people that I have that become prospects for me are from referrals of existing doctors. And what better way to show how well taken care of your patients are?
So, we have multiple doctors at PartnerMD. Twenty-eight internal and family physicians. Each doctor has their own nurse. We have certified health coaches. And we have offices in Richmond, Baltimore, McLean, Greenville, South Carolina, and Atlanta, Georgia.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (07:24):
So people call me all the time and say, what is concierge medicine? Well, it's a membership practice, concierge membership. So our doctors take a really reduced number of patients. And because they take such a reduced number of patients, we're able to offer many amenities, but that's also why we charge a membership fee.
So people are paying for that time, for better access to primary care from a physician who has fewer patients. So your typical experience in a doctor's office is a lot of people going in to see a doctor for a short period of time, and very often leaving with a lot of questions unanswered. The PartnerMD experience brings fewer people in to see the doctor, as Dr. Haacke-Golden mentioned, for a longer period of time and leaving with a health plan, as well as having their questions answered.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (08:32):
So why is it different at PartnerMD? How does it feel different? So a traditional practice is seeing 25 to 40 patients a day. And how did you, um, fall into that category in your former practice, Dr. Haacke-Golden? How many patients did you see on an average day?
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (08:54):
We had structured, in my last practice, that we were seeing a little under that 25. I think our max was about 22 people per day. But we chose to do that because we knew, as a group, the importance of trying to spend as much time as possible with people, but still we were, we would say it was a struggle. Even if you know how to do everything we needed to do with that 20-22 patients, it was a lot. So, and I agree with the numbers of the 6 to 10 that's what I'm doing here. And it just opens the door for so much more care.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (09:35):
And, you know, I just find it appalling that the national average on the time that a doctor spends with a patient is seven minutes. And I know you would agree, you cannot practice good medicine in seven minutes with a patient. In a traditional practice, the doctors are not usually on call.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (09:53):
At PartnerMD, like he says, we see 6 to 10 patients a day. Our schedule is done in 30 minute increments. So the minimum amount of time that you will spend with your physician is 30 minutes. We do things like a 60 minute new patient appointments, if needed. We do allot 90 minutes for a physical once a year, and we always have a doctor on call. A PartnerMD physician is on call 24/7/365. And we'll answer the phone when you call after hours.
So in a traditional practice, that national average is 24 days to wait for an appointment and 40 minutes in the lobby, which I think is actually conservative in my area. We seem to wait more than 40 minutes. And if you call the nurse, the nurse may or may not call you back. You usually have no after hours access. And many times you don't have referrals for specialists, either.
At PartnerMD, we say that you have same or next day appointments with basically no wait time. Your physician will call you back that day if you call them You have 24/7/365 physician care and coordination of care with specialists. We have referral coordinators in each office that if you need a referral to a specialist, we will make that appointment for you, make sure records go from our office to their office and back again. So you've got one doctor that's overlooking all your health care. Have you seen that improvement, Dr. Haacke-Golden? Have you been here long enough to experience that?
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (11:31):
Yeah, it's great. I especially point towards the specialist coordination, having that person here in the office to ask and within 24 hours, there's somebody actually getting CT scans and appointments with specialists set up. It really is a very quick turnaround, and therefore patients are getting their care quicker and the responses are getting back, and our care team gets set up quicker. I'm definitely seeing it.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (11:59):
Good to hear. I can just stop you for one second. Um, we have a question that's been submitted around specialist care and the coordination of that. It says: Do I have to see your specialist, or can I see any specialist? If we can address that right now, if you don't mind.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (12:14):
Absolutely. PartnerMD is totally independent from hospital systems in every location. And our doctors think that is a good thing because we're not restricted to a particular hospital system like many doctors who work within hospital systems are. Our doctors can work with specialists that you were already going to.
When we send out new patient form forms, part of those forms is to give us permission to access records for wherever you want us to get them, so that Dr. Haacke-Golden and his colleagues can look at all your records, oversee all your care work with any specialists that you want them to. If you need a referral for a specialist, if you need a specialist and you aren't currently going to one, then these doctors are connected in the area and they know who they want to send you to. And if you have recommendations, they'll listen and you can work together to find those specialists that is right for you. Did I leave anything out with that?
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (13:16):
That's very true. We can work with anybody.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (13:20):
So overall, instead of being limited and hurried in your medical care, you have more personal time with your physician.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (13:30):
And Kristin reminded me of something before I go to the next slide. I forgot to mention in the beginning that, please do know that you can raise your hand and ask a question, just type in a question. If Kristin thinks it's pertinent to what we're talking to, she'll stop us like she did just then, or we can wait till we get to the end and we will address all the questions to either myself or to Dr. Haacke-Golden, whichever they apply to. And you kind of say that I will take the membership questions, any of the financial questions, he will take the medical questions, because one of the other things we do really well here is we have a person to take care of everything. So all the doctors have to do is take care of their patients. Some of the doctors have no idea how I sign someone up. I always tell people they have to go through me to get to the doctor, but once you get through me, then you belong to the doctor. So, please know that you can ask a question at any time and we will get to it before we end today.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (14:40):
All right. So three steps to optimal health that we look at in our practice as the 24/7/365 physician care that we mentioned.
We also have available very advanced physicals. You can imagine if you have two hours allotted for your annual physical, that that is going to be a much more thorough physical than you are currently experiencing in a traditional doctor's office.
We also have our wellness specialist, and I'm very passionate about this because we do this so much better than any other concierge practice that I've come in contact with. We have certified health coaches who really know their stuff. They work in conjunction with the doctors. They have access to your medical records. They can help you with things like diet, exercise, stress, sleep, nutrition, whatever it is that you and your doctor decide, your healthcare goals are, then your wellness specialists can help you achieve those goals. How many times have you gone to the doctor, and the doctor will give you a pamphlet and say, you know, you really need to eat less and exercise more and that's it? There's nobody to help you with that. Dr. Haacke-Golden, would you like to comment on that and your experience?
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (16:01):
Yeah, I know that you said it exactly right. I think we've all got great intentions with our words to help people and all of us want to do better with our health. Um, but if left to ourselves, we're kind of our own worst enemies sometimes. Coach Brandon's here in our office, and I've looked to him already so many times to be a coach for people, to be somebody, to keep working on accountability issues. And we all know it changes. So if you try something, let's say a walking regimen, and you find out, hey, that's hurting my knees too bad. You've got somebody to go back to you and say, Brandon, this isn't working. Can we brainstorm and come up with another way of helping me exercise? So to stay motivated, that's really already worked out well. So it's really encouraging.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (16:50):
Absolutely. I won't tell you that our doctors don't write prescriptions, because I'm sure they all do every single day, but if they can help you achieve a healthy lifestyle and stay off prescriptions as you age, they would much rather do that.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (17:10):
So personalized concierge, physician care, what does that mean? A trusted partnership with your physician? You have the 24/7/365 physician care. Acute care can be handled by phone sometimes by email. And tele-health when possible if we learned anything good from COVID. I think it's that some people really like having telehealth appointments, you know, when you have the small things and you don't want to come in the office, or maybe you feel really, really bad, and you don't want to come into the office, that option is there. And I meant to mention that with wellness, we have really learned that people enjoy touching base with the wellness specialist on a tele-health appointment at their office or at their home, instead of having to take time to physically come into the office. So we now have that tele-health option as well.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (18:09):
We have less than five minutes, wait time. So really no waiting if you're sick, we will get you in same or next day, 30 minute minimum appointments, coordination, and quarterbacking of care, health coaching, which is integrated with your physician and probably the most important of all peace of mind that you have a physician when you need it.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (18:37):
We also do advanced, customized physicals at PartnerMD. If you are a member of our practice, a classic physical, the two-hour physical is billed to your insurance, which in itself is a very thorough physical. We also work with companies at PartnerMD and have executives that come to us for upgraded physicals that last five hours and eight hours. We offer that option to our patients as well, but this goes beyond what insurance covers. So there is a charge for upgrading your physical, but these physicals can offer you advanced cardiac screenings, lipid screenings, genetic counseling, and testing. And there is a whole list of customized options. And if you look at the enhanced physical, it tells you, you have two custom options. And in the signature physical, you have six. Well, a lot of times people will say, well, I don't know what I need to do.
So that is an opportunity to talk to your doctor and decide what options, based on your personal medical history and your family history, on things that you should look at that your insurance is not going to pay for. Dr. Mumper always says, our medical director at PartnerMD, we find pink flags before they become red. That's another one of those little things that stuck in my mind, but we're very good at doing that. And, Dr. Haacke-Golden, just doing a classic physical at PartnerMD, which is filed to insurance for members, how does that compare with the physicals that you've done previously?
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (20:23):
Yeah, it really, it does not. My physicals previous to this were hurried and just making sure I absolutely had the minimum of healthcare done for people. Which, I mean, really it is what you want to do a good job for sure. I was doing what was needed, but this just allows for us to go beyond, looking at the whole person. There's so many things to talk about, with mental health issues and sleep issues, quality of life issues that we're able to get through in that time. And I didn't at first, I didn't think I'd be able to fill up that time. I was like, how could I possibly spend that amount of time talking to people? It's very easy. We all have a lot of things to talk about. We all have a lot of things that may not seem maybe important day-to-day, but when you break them down, I like that pink flag idea when, you know, small things that if we can address them and make up a health care plan for things, and maybe overt something bad coming in the future. That's pretty neat.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (21:34):
So I find this very interesting 80% of our health is due to our own choices, not our genetics. So that's why coming to a system, or facility, like PartnerMD is so important because you can discover what needs to be done. And then you can do it to stay healthy as you age, because if you don't have your health, it is so true, that nothing else matters. You know, we all put into our 401k or our savings accounts and, you know, wait for our retirement. But if we're not healthy, when we get there, what difference does it make?
Melissa Gifford, Membership (22:29):
So how much does it cost? For an initial person on a membership at PartnerMD, depending on the practice location, that range is $150 to $184 per month. PartnerMD allows people to pay monthly, quarterly, semi-annually or annually, and it does not affect the rate on how you choose to pay it. So the rate is a set rate, but you have options on how you pay it. We do ask that you leave a credit card on file so that we don't have to bill. If you add an additional adult to an existing membership that is anywhere from $134 to $159, depending on the location. And we have these phenomenal rates for children up to age, 22 at $50 a month. And then a young adult, age 22 to 26, is only $75 a month. So that can all be added onto the same membership.
We don't have a family plan, so to speak, but we can create one with different rates, with the number of people on a single membership.
For a two hour physical, that is charged to your insurance, we call that the classic physical. If you want to upgrade your physical as a member of the practice, we give reduced rates for that. A 5-hour physical is $1,600 and an 8-hour physical is $2,900. For ongoing care, emails, phone calls, your 24/7 physician on call, coordination of specialist care and health coaching are all a part of your membership. So the only additional charges you have when you come to PartnerMD are anytime you see the doctor or go to the lab, telehealth visits and in office visits and labs are charged to your insurance.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (24:37):
So we like to say at PartnerMD that we're not just there for you. We are there with you. So you're never alone on your path to health. And another statement that we use in marketing a lot that I really like is it's like having a doctor in the family. And I have a brother-in-law, who's a doctor, so I totally get that. Before PartnerMD came into my life, how many times did I call him and say, Mickey, can you help me with whatever? But now you've got a doctor to call who is legitimately a doctor who can look at your records after hours, call in prescriptions, treat you as needed and take care of you. 24/7/365.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (25:27):
We have questions. We do have several questions submitted. Thank you, Melissa and Dr. Haacke-Golden. And just as a reminder to everyone, you can click the Q&A button at the bottom of your screen and submit any questions and all questions are anonymous. So it's a great time to get some easy answers from us about concierge medicine and free physician answers as well from Dr. Haacke-Golden. It's great to have him here.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (25:52):
One question that someone submitted just now about memberships says: is there a contract? You referenced the monthly membership fee, but isn't it annual? That is a great question. I usually include that, but left it out. And, I kind of laugh when I say this because, PartnerMD does not ask for a binding agreement. If you ever want to leave PartnerMD, all we ever ask is a 30-day notice in writing.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (26:22):
And that doesn't matter if it's 2 months or 10 years. And the reason I laugh when I say that is because, you know why we do that at PartnerMD ... because people don't leave. Once you experience what we have here, our retention rate is phenomenal, and you won't want to leave to go back to traditional medicine. But to answer the question, anytime you need to leave for whatever reason, it's a 30 day notice in writing.Thank you for covering that.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (26:56):
Another question asks about insurance. Do you take Medicare and how does it work with insurance? If you do? We do take Medicare and we are in network with most major providers. So your membership fee is an out-of-pocket expense. It's a membership fee. It's not a medical fee. So when you come for your medical visits, we would file your insurance, just like any other provider would do. And you would still be responsible for any copays or deductibles. As I said, we are in network with most major providers. You can look at your particular insurance on our website. Our marketing team has done a wonderful job of making that available for you. If you have questions about specific plans, of course you can ask me or any of our other membership staff.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (27:48):
Great. Thank you. I think that also covers another question that was submitted that says: is there a copay for the doctor visit and, specifically around the word copay, it depends on your plan, right? So all doctor's visits, whether they're in person or tele-health are billed to your insurance. And if your insurance plan requires a copay, then there is a copay or a deductible or a co-insurance, whatever your plan is. I know a lot of our members though find that what's a pleasant surprise with concierge medicine is you have such greater access to your physician by phone and patient portal that a lot of times you actually end up seeing the physician less and having fewer actual doctor's visits because there is such a greater access. How many times have we all called the doctor and, even if it's a tiny little question, the response you often get is, unfortunately, you need to come in. I just have a quick question. Can it just be a quick question, but it's never a quick question out of traditional practice, unfortunately, it's no, you need to come in and book an appointment and come in in a couple of weeks. So if that's necessary, then we'll certainly get you in quickly.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (29:01):
Another question: are our doctors W2s or contractors? Can any lab tests be ordered and billed to insurance at the patient requests without a disease? I'll take the question if you don't mind, Melissa, around W2 for contractors. PartnerMD physicians, and all of our clinicians, are all full time employees. They are never contractors and we make sure that they're all handling on-call, as well. So for example, some physician practices out there, even concierge practices, for on-call coverage, they might outsource that to a phone line, some type of outsourced vendor service or nurse practitioner or physician's assistant. At PartnerMD it's always going to be a PartnerMD physician who is a full-time PartnerMD employee, as well.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (29:58):
Dr. Haacke-Golden, I'll let you take the question around the lab tests. can they be ordered and billed to insurance that the patient requests without a disease? Would you mind taking that one?
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (30:08):
Yeah. That is a tough question, actually, because I've run into it many times. all insurances are very different. I would say the majority of this is my experience anyway. the majority of commercial insurances, if we're looking for labs to be done without a disease state, sort of in a screening mode, we can usually figure out how to do that. They'll cover much more in terms of health maintenance. Medicare is very different. They're very linked to having a disease state to kind of pin a lab to. So it's a work in progress. And I think it's a challenge. It's the whole coding world of everything that doesn't necessarily change anything from traditional medicine to concierge medicine on that. That's sort of a be all problem. Not a very good answer, because I think it's a really hard thing for all of us.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (31:09):
Yeah. The insurance situation, it can be problematic, right? Regardless of whether it's traditional or concierge. And that is part of why, with the higher level advanced physicals that we perform, they're just paid out of pocket. Right. Cause we know that things like getting your calcium score, getting your CT heart scan done, it's just not covered by insurance at all. Period. You know, very rarely even with a family history of heart disease, and it's just easier sometimes to pay out of pocket for it and not run it through insurance. Right? A few more questions.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (31:47):
Another one around billing, if you mind covering it: Can HSA be used for membership fees? That's a great question.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (31:54):
You know, I find that sometimes it can,. It depends on how the HSA is set up. I very rarely see an instance where I can take your HSA card and run it and it will work, because our system tags it as a membership fee and not a medical fee. So it's going to be denied.
But I do often have people who can take their PartnerMD receipt or statement and turn it into their HSA and get reimbursed. So again, it depends on your particular HSA and how it is set up. I'm going to cover FSAs here too, because many times question comes up, and FSA will not cover your membership fee. But there are FSAs, and most FSAs will cover certain medical expenses like your wellness visits, up to four visits a year. I think we can provide a receipt for a wellness visit that you can bill to your FSA and that's a legitimate charge. So, where it won't pay for your entire membership, it can make a dent in it.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (33:11):
Such a good point. There are ways we can help our patients kind of work around, right, by leveraging parts of the membership to apply to your FSA or HSA. Even the physical. The out-of-pocket physicals can definitely be applied to an FSA or an HSA. The regular member physical, we can even sometimes apply part of that as well. I know I've had our membership billing department work with people on a particular statement that they would need it done a certain way to file on an HSA. So we're open to doing whatever we can to help. Absolutely. Just check with your plan administrator and see what their rules are, because they're all different.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (33:56):
We have a great question around, are you only located in Richmond in Greenville? Can you give info regarding how to find other concierge practices elsewhere? Also what if I'm somewhere else and need help? For example, Tennessee, et cetera, or another country?
So a couple of questions there, but where is PartnerMD? But also, another great question around, you know, what, if you're traveling or are living elsewhere part of the year? Which a lot of people do.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (34:20):
Absolutely. So we have 4 offices now in the state of Virginia. We're in Richmond, we're in Midlothian, Short Pump is our newest office, and we have a McLean office, which is a Virginia address. We kind of consider that Washington DC. We're in Baltimore, Maryland in Owings Mills, which is outside of Baltimore. We're outside of Atlanta in Sandy Springs. And then we're in Greenville, South Carolina. That doesn't cover the whole United States by any means. But remember, you've got that 365 days a year, 24/7 access to a physician. So if you are out of town and you need your PartnerMD physician, you can make a tele-health appointment. You can call and talk to your physician.
I love to tell this story. I know Kristin's heard it before. One time in the Greenville office, we had a patient flying from China through Chicago, to Dallas and he, or an admin, or someone called. He had a history of strep throat. He had terrible strep throat, and he knew that's what he had. He was able to talk to his PartnerMD physician and that physician's nurse was able to get a prescription for him in Chicago, close to the airport, so he could pick it up before he flew to Dallas. I thought that was amazing. And those are the kinds of things that we do. So, even though we do not have locations in other areas, we can serve as you, as a member. We even have executives who don't live in a certain area, but come to PartnerMD once a year for their physical and maintain a membership that they handle remotely.
We have people who live somewhere else for six months out of the year, but see us when they're there for those six months and then handle things that come up in between remotely. So if you're somewhere else and you need a referral somewhere, we'll help look that up. We'll try to coordinate things as well as we can on a remote basis.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (36:38):
And if there's anyone on the call who does live full time in a state where we do not have an office or a physician, or you have family members, a lot of times we help our patients find very similar levels of care in other parts of the country that are nowhere near us. And that's what we're here for, is to help you. Once people experience this way of care, which is so different from what most people have experienced their whole lives, they really want it for others in their lives.
We're happy to help you find that in another state. MDVIP is a national chain of concierge, physician providers. It's almost like a franchise model around the country. Definitely check them out. We have lots of blogs on the PartnerMD website that compare and contrast us, compared to MDVIP and other concierge providers, because we all are different. We all take a slightly different approach and we encourage everyone to really do your research and figure out whether this approach overall is right for you. And then once you decide that, which provider is the best for you as well, both in terms of how they approach their care and the specific physician, some key differences between us and other providers that we've talked about a little bit already are that we are only physicians.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (37:57):
You will always have a personal relationship with a physician. It is never a nurse practitioner or a physician's assistant who you will be seeing. You'll have a great nurse who comes along with that physician, who's part of it. Then the nurses get to know you just as well as those physicians do, but that's a big part of how we are different. So if you are looking at other concierge practices, be sure to check that out.
Another key difference that Melissa talked about earlier is that we don't lock you into a long-term contract. It is a month-to-month basis. And that's really important, I think, in comforting to people. You pay month-to-month, or if you do to pay annually and for some reason, move or decide to leave PartnerMD, you get a full, prorated refund back with 30 days of written notice. So, be sure to look into that at other practices as well. We all have different policies, and many of them do lock you into annual contracts that you pay in full upfront, particularly MDVIP. Once you have the physical completed, you are not able to get much money back from that afterwards. So just check into how that works as well, just to give you a little bit more detail.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (39:09):
A question that Dr. Haacke-Golden. I think you should take more of a clinical question. I have an auto-immune disease that is in remission, but take maintenance meds, which requires semi-annual visits and blood work with a rheumatologist. I also see an eye doctor annually to make sure the meds are not affecting my eyes. I see my OB GYN annually and my dermatologist. I do not have a primary care doctor, would becoming a PartnerMD member just be adding primary care or would it also eliminate some of these other appointments? Such a great question. There's a lot in there, and it's a wonderful question to pose.
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (39:47):
Yeah, it is a really good question. And I think there's a pretty simple answer to that question. Maybe a little bit bigger answer, cause I do have a number of patients with a similar set up with multiple specialists. I think the simple answer is it, the primary care doctor for someone with a complex medical issue is ... my look at that anyway, as a primary care doctor is ... to be a quarterback to help, to decipher answers, lab results, future tests, unknown, problems that come up, and help my patients figure out maybe which specialists they should be seeing even amongst their groups, or if there's confusion on lab results they're getting, or they just don't know which way to turn. We can sometimes do the lab work here. I personally love to get all the lab work done on my own and send it to the doctors because it means I can see it all.
Sometimes it's just with that coordination of care, it's hard to get labs. Not that we can't get them, but they're just sometimes not right in front of you. So I will act as the lab for various, specialists. And then, it's hard to take away my patients from their specialists. It may cut down a visit or two a year if we're able to do it all at thevisits that we see each other, but it's hard to take it away, because if there is such a good relationship, and somebody is stable you need to keep that going just for the "in case" that something happens, you've got to have that relationship with your specialist. So that's the confusing answer there. The easy answer is the primary care doctor wants to be, at least this primary care doctor does, wants to be the quarterback to know what's going on with all the different sub-specialists. I hope that wasn't too confusing.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (42:00):
Yeah, it's a complicated answer because I agree with you. The simple answer is, most people can benefit from having a primary care physician, even if you already are seeing all of these specialists, right. To have that one person who's pulling it all together so that you're not having, as a non-clinician, myself. I'm not having to pull it all together.
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (42:28):
And one other thought there too, is that there's a wide range of how educated people are on their own health care issues and motivated sometimes too. And something that I've seen with PartnerMD, too, is when you've got, there's so many factors that go in to say, if you've got a cardiac problem or a rheumatologic problem that you can work on on your own, that's going to help to benefit your underlying illness, whether it's emotional health or sleeping, or eating, weight loss exercise that oftentimes the specialists don't have a whole lot of time to be thinking about that big picture. And if we can bring that back, that could easily help, I think, in the long run, maybe save medications that are added by the specialists, maybe reduce the number of visits that you have to end up seeing the specialist for flares of cardiac problems or rheumatologic things. So that is something, I think, that having the primary care aspect for somebody who does have a complex medical problems can really help with.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (43:39):
I had a reception in the Greenville office years ago when I first started at PartnerMD and invited specialists to come in and see our office. And one specialist told me that he thought he was able to do more with our patients than he was a traditional patient because the information he received was so much more complete. Not only was the information complete, he actually got it. Our referral coordinator made sure that the information was there prior to the patient's visit. So it just allows the specialist, who doesn't have 30 minutes usually with the patient, to work more efficiently. So I thought that was a great point.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (44:25):
Definitely. We have another question that says in emergency situations. If one of us finds ourselves in an ER situation, will our PartnerMD physician coordinate with the ER doc that is treating us? Great question.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (44:40):
Dr. Haacke-Golden, Do you want to take that or would you like me to?
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (44:44):
Usually, it's really rare that it all falls into place, where we get the ability to coordinate in an emergency setting with an emergency room doctor. I have had the opportunity with patients though, if they're calling me or if they're in the office and we're coordinating a trip to the emergency room, to spend the time talking to the emergency room before the patient arrives. But once the path starts happening at the emergency room, those doctors rarely have the ability to pick up the phone and call us. They've got too much going on. But we will sometimes be able then to talk though with family members when people are in the hospitalfor them to get us timely information and for us to answer questions. I would love it if it would work that way. And probably, you know, one hospital, one doctor's office town, it would work better, but it's probably too complex for that to happen.
Melissa Gifford, Membership (45:58):
We always ask that patients call and let us know that they're in the emergency room or in the hospital. And if the emergency room doctor does have questions or things that they need to know that they might not have access to, whichever PartnerMD doctor answers the phone is on-call has immediate access to the patient's records. So they would be able to answer questions that were needed in an emergency situation. And if a patient is in the hospital, the PartnerMD doctor can talk to the hospitalist, can visit the patient in the hospital, can be there to answer questions for family members, that kind of thing. So I think you make a great point though, Dr. Haacke-Golden, we're as involved as we can be. Sometimes that can be limited.
Eric Haacke-Golden, M.D. (46:48):
Yeah.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (46:49):
Yeah. I agree. I agree with that. And it's, just from a personal anecdote, I had an interesting situation happen myself in the ER last year where I ended up in the ER with extreme, acute sudden abdominal pain. And my PartnerMD physician, to your point Dr. Haacke-Golden, my physician was there with me the whole time on my cell phone. But the hospitalist doesn't have time to, you know, walk away, make a phone call, figure out, come back. They're dealing with so many patients and doing the best job they can. The clinician who was also attending to me in the ER, not a physician, either. She was a physician's assistant, and I gained so much peace of mind knowing though that I had not only a physician, but my physician on the phone with me while I was in that ER, visit and through text, he was actually throughout the three hours or so I was there, able to communicate back and forth.
And what has she done this? Has she run these tests? Yes, yes. And I was even holding up my phone and saying, he's asking if you can double check this and run that. And she really appreciated it. It was great that he could share my medical history, my personal medical history, my family medical history right there with her. She wasn't having to go back and track someone down, I was facilitating it, but I'm making it easier for her to provide better quality care. And I think all parties involved really appreciated that. And that wouldn't have happened if I couldn't have gotten my physician on the phone right then and there, which great.
Another thing that I think is a benefit is the way we are able to work with hospitalists, but we are not associated with a hospital system. So we, you know, we are independent. We are an independent company. Again, our physicians are employees of PartnerMD not of a hospital system. And that enables our physicians to be even stronger advocates for you as a patient in front of that hospital. And with those physicians and be able to push a little harder to get you the care that they feel like you need and deserve. Then, because they're not pushing on a peer or a coworker, right, they're pushing on someone else. Maybe it might even be an administrator at a hospital who is not connected with us. And sometimes it's easier to push a little bit and be an advocate for you when it's from a different company. And I've definitely experienced that firsthand as well. Well, do we have any more questions from the audience today?
Thank you so much for everyone's time. I appreciate it. Anything else, Melissa or Dr. Haacke-Golden that you'd like to cover?
Melissa Gifford, Membership (49:47):
I can't think of anything. I just invite anyone who's interested to explore a little further. We do offer the opportunity to do what we call a meet-and-greet with a physician. We used to invite you to come into the office and sit down and chat with the physician. But since we're in the middle of a pandemic, we don't do that anymore, but we can use our telehealth system so that you can put a face with a name and chat with your physician. And there are the physician that you're interested in and there is no cost or obligation to do that. Just an opportunity to talk to the physician, not a medical visit, but to ask them how they treat their patients.
Kristin Richardson, Moderator (50:31):
Great. Thank you for your time. Thank you everyone for attending today. And if you have any further questions, feel free to reach out to us at PartnerMD.com. Take care. Thank you.
