How Direct Primary Care Can Work with Your Insurance

Welcome to the world of healthcare… Where a thousand different forms of insurance and coverage plans can cause a headache if you let it. Should you seek private care? Should you stick to the insurance plan provided by your work? If so, which do you choose..HMO, PPO, EPO?…. BUT WAIT!

Before you start to panic, let us explain the world of direct primary care, the benefit it provides, and how it can be used to either replace or work WITH your current insurance carrier. 

Direct primary care (DPC) is simply that- direct care to you as the patient by your doctor. No middleman, no third parties. Just doctor to patient direct comprehensive care… as it should be. 

DPC is based on a membership model, where you pay a monthly membership to get access to your doctor through texts, emails, phone calls. Texting your doctor? That’s right! You can text your provider day or night for any issues you may be having… That’s real accessibility. 

Many of us today have “great insurance,” but is it really? Trying to get in to see your insurance doctor can take up to 30 days – if not more- depending on the reason for your visit.

Experiencing a simple cold or have flu-like symptoms?

Did you have a recent fall and need immediate treatment or evaluation by your provider?

Instead of paying an additional, expensive copay for a quick in-office visit or worse, being told there’s no availability until 1-3 months from now so you better go to urgent care and accrue ANOTHER expense (as is often the case with traditional insurance models), a DPC will assess and treat you immediately, at NO additional cost to your monthly membership fee. 

DPC aims to fix these major healthcare barriers by allowing for same day/next day appointments and costing a fraction of the price of traditional insurances. Direct primary care, such as Elevated Health, was created to “improve health outcomes and lower overall health care costs” for all patients (AAFNP, 2019). Simply stated, direct primary care eliminates the middleman- insurance. 

Now you may be thinking, “How could this work WITH my insurance?”

DPC providers can still use your insurance to help you pay for medications, imaging, bloodwork, and other procedures. If you know your insurance will cover these other expenses, then your DPC provider will work with it to help get you the lowest cost! DPC can also work with your insurance to help you find specialists, should they be required. DPC provides the ability to get lower cost and affordable care, but still be able to use the insurance you have. Afterall, DPC is a partnership with the patient.

So, when you are looking for the right healthcare provider and have “good insurance”, before you call your insurance doctor and wait a month to be seen, take a look at the DPC world as an adjunct to your insurance and experience accessible and affordable healthcare. 

Interested in learning more? Contact us as Elevated Health- https://www.elevatedhealth.md/ – to book a FREE “meet & greet” with one of our wonderful providers where you can learn more about what direct primary care can offer you and your family. Let’s take the stress out of healthcare!