Practice Management
For those willing to pay extra for faster access to care and essentially more of the clinician’s time, concierge models can offer patients enhanced convenience and personal attention beyond the traditional 15-minute primary care office visit. Now concierge medicine programs are springing up on college campuses, according to Axios. Programs are no doubt marketed to nervous parents who worry about their child being away from home and who likewise may be concerned about the quality …
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Lawmakers in Alaska have approved a bill to legalize subscription-based healthcare in the state. If signed into law by the governor, providers would be able to offer care to patients who pay a monthly fee without leveraging any insurance benefits, according to Anchorage Daily News. The bill includes a provision requiring subscription-based clinics to continue accepting Medicare patients and the uninsured. The provision is meant to address the shortage of providers willing to accept patients …
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Alan A. Ayers, MBA, Macc Urgent Message: Urgent care is a consumer-driven phenomenon, and physician entrepreneurs continue to evolve the delivery of urgent care services in response to changing consumer preferences, both inside and beyond the brick-and-mortar facility. Citation: Ayers A. Thinking outside the box to bring urgent care to the patient. J Urgent Care Med. 2024;18(4): 31-33. While unregulated by most states, the term “urgent care” historically has come to mean a base offering …
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Urgent care operators considering adding a concierge medicine component to their business may find rationale to do so—or not to do so—in a new position paper published in the November 10 issue of Annals of Internal Medicine. The paper declines to give either a thumbs-up or a thumbs-down to direct patient contracting practices (DPCPs)—aka “concierge medicine”—but does offer perspective on the pros and cons relative to medical quality, cost, access, and other factors. On the …
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