The traditional fee-for-service practice model has historically held many limitations for patient care.  To meet the overhead costs of running a practice, offices are challenged to fit as many patients as possible into a day—often resulting in limited face time with the doctor, more referrals to specialists than necessary, and considerable wait times for appointments.

Direct primary care (DPC) allows patients improved access to a physician who knows their health histories, and greater time and flexibility for doctor-patient interactions—often along with significantly reduced costs and transparent pricing that still allow comparable compensation for practitioners.

Rather than striving to maintain a high-volume practice, DPC physicians have a panel of patients that subscribe to their care on a monthly basis.  This allows physicians the freedom to care for their patients in a flexible way, and gives patients improved access to same- and next-day care.

In this insightful talk, integrative family physician Dr. Lillian White will explain the genesis and evolution of the DPC model.  She will discuss both the advantages and challenges of working with patients through the monthly membership format, and share her perspective and personal experience after a year in DPC practice.

This event will be of interest to any medical students or residents considering options for their future practices, as well as any practicing physicians or other healthcare professionals curious about the pros and cons of adopting a more flexible and potentially more rewarding practice model.

Speaker Bio:

Dr. Lillian White, MD, ABFM, IFMCP, is a board-certified family medicine physician practicing from an integrative and holistic perspective, and a functional medicine practitioner certified by the Institute for Functional Medicine. Upon completing a three-year family medicine residency at the Cleveland Clinic, she realized a longstanding vision for patient care by establishing Empowered Health, a family medicine practice in Rocky River, OH that employs the Direct Primary Care membership model.  She recently celebrated her one-year anniversary in that practice, which she describes as “the culmination of hours and months and years of dreaming about what an ideal medical practice could look like.”

Dr. White has many distinguished professional affiliations.  She serves as president of the Northeast Ohio Academy of Family Physicians, as a member of the executive board of The Academy of Medicine of Cleveland and Northern Ohio, and as a board member of the Ohio Academy of Family Physicians Foundation.  Dr. White also belongs to the American Academy of Family Physicians and is a contributing editor for the American Family  Physician Journal.

She has adjunct assistant professorships at both Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine and Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine.

Dr. White is also a former co-leader of the AIHM’s Cleveland chapter who was instrumental in helping revive the chapter in 2020.   She organized and delivered one of the very first talks for the newly reconstituted chapter—on Direct Primary Care.  Her current webinar thus represents the transition from aspiration to experience.

 

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As always, non-members and med students interested in integrative medicine are welcome to attend.

Register Here.

AIHM Cleveland Chapter contact: petergeller.lac@gmail.com