First of all, what is concierge medicine? Concierge medicine is essentially personalized healthcare. The longer answer is that when you subscribe to a concierge medical service, you pay a doctor a retainer fee and you see them when you need to. The doctor only has a set capacity, so he or she can allow enough time for each patient.

With the Affordable Care Act, the goal is to make sure that everyone has access to medical attention. One major problem with this ideology is that there’s an increase in patients, but the number of doctors cannot match it. The result ends up being packed schedules for doctors, long waiting room times, and a problem with urgent care.

Concierge medicine works to make sure that doctors have a full set of patients, without being overbooked. Throughout the year, when you need your doctor, you call and talk to them. You talk directly to your doctor and find out the best time for you to meet, if you need to meet at all. Since your doctor only has a set number of patients, you have the assurance that your doctor knows you and doesn’t have to look at another doctor’s notes to remember pieces of your medical history.

The Affordable Care Act was intended to allow people access to medical help. When you go to the doctor, you typically have to pay copay. For someone who wants or needs to see his or her doctor, that additional cost can be a limiting factor. For that reason, the retainer fee for a concierge doctor can save patients a lot of money. Doctors who work that way are not incentivized to take as many appointments as possible.

Doctors and patients both benefit from concierge medicine because a lot of the financial pressure is relieved. Where copays are a hurdle of traditional medicine, they push doctors to take on more patients and see more patients in the same window of time. Doctors shouldn’t feel rushed to get through an appointment to get to the next patient and patients should never feel like they aren’t being thoroughly cared for.

Medical practices are evolving to deal with a number of challenges that they face and with every year and every piece of legislation passed, some challenges are figured out but there are always more added. Talk to a concierge doctor and find out what a difference you can make by switching to concierge medicine and personalized care. Medical care should always be about the patient.

Are you ready to learn more about concierge medicine and see if it is right for you? Read about our individual and corporate programs.