FAQs About Direct Primary Care
Focus Family Medicine Membership Questions
✔️Text, call, email, or send us a message through our website to set up a “meet and greet” call with Dr. Lane! *
✔️No commitments, obligations or pressure.
*No medical advice will be given on this call.
✔️We do not require a long-term contract.
✔️We expect to have an open, honest, respectful relationship with you. If you have voiced a complaint that we cannot satisfy together, we will gladly allow you to terminate your membership with 30 days’ notice.
In providing thorough, consistent care, we seek to prevent or reduce hospitalizations and specialty referrals. In instances where those types of care are necessary, we will communicate with your hospitalist and work closely with any specialist involved with your care.
This is one of the benefits of being a member—because we know you well, we can usually care for you even when you’re away from home. Many illnesses can be diagnosed and treated by communication through by phone, secure text, email, or webcam. If necessary and appropriate, we can call prescriptions into the pharmacy nearest you.
Members can contact Dr. Lane directly via phone, text, email or video chat. We request that after-hours phone calls and texts are limited to urgent questions or concerns.
Insurance questions
No, we do not take any health insurance. In order to provide you with the best quality healthcare, it is necessary to operate without the insurance restrictions and boundaries dictating your care based on algorithms (“click box medicine”).
We work directly for you, the patient. Perhaps the most critical distinction in our model of care centers on a direct, personal relationship between you and your doctor.
Absolutely. You need only sign a one-time waiver declaring that neither you nor your doctor will directly bill Medicare for our services. Medicare can still be used to cover any laboratory testing, imaging, medications, or hospitalizations.
We recommend our patients continue a major medical plan with a high deductible and health savings account to ensure financial help should a catastrophe, emergency, hospitalization or referral to a specialist be necessary.
Direct Primary Care coupled with a high deductible “wrap around” policy is often equivalent to the cost of traditional health insurance.
Some of our members prefer to use a Health Share such as https://www.zionhealth.org or https://sedera.com. These cooperative plans provide catastrophic coverage.
General questions
No. Although they are both essentially a membership based medical service, concierge services often cost several thousand dollars more per year.
➡️Concierge medicine has always been thought of as a service only the wealthy could afford. Concierge practices typically charge a yearly fee (often $2000-3000+ per year), and generally continue to bill insurance which still leaves you responsible for copays, coinsurance, and deductibles. There is a financial advantage to require an in-office visit.
➡️Direct Primary Care on the other hand is geared towards being very affordable, family-centered, and flexible to fit your exact needs. A DPC practice does not bill any insurances and because of the low overhead can afford to pass that value on to the patients in the form of lower costs. There are NO co-pays in a direct primary care practice and NO need to always have you come to the office. When medically appropriate, your concerns can be handled via phone, saving you time and allowing you to stay at work or home.
Patients who cannot afford health insurance or who prefer a Health share.
Patients who have a high-deductible health insurance plan that limits their access to primary care due to fears about cost.
Patients with “good” health insurance who are tired of feeling rushed or unheard at the doctor or seeing a different doctor, nurse practitioner or physician assistant at each visit with no opportunity to develop a relationship with their physician.
Small business owners who want to provide a health benefit to their employees but, cannot afford a traditional insurance plan or want to lower the cost of providing insurance for their employees by pairing insurance with a DPC membership.
Absolutely! Today, most medical care is reactionary. We see a doctor only when symptoms arise or we feel sick. The traditional healthcare model encourages you not to visit your physician until you are very sick.
But at Focus Family Medicine, you can see Dr. Lane any time. While we always provide care for our patients when they need it, we also emphasize the importance of proactively maintaining your health. You and your family will benefit from a personalized, preventive healthcare plan:
We can prevent things from happening instead of waiting for them to happen. This means fewer emergency room or urgent care visits.
There is nothing standing in the way of talking to your doctor. You can call us, see us the same day or next day, or simply ask a quick question via text.
Over time, we’ll have a comprehensive understanding of your unique health requirements.
✔️Appointments are available to members either same or next business day.
✔️New patient appointment are available typically in a week.
We purchase them from a wholesale pharmacy and do not mark them up as the drug stores do. In some instances, this can be the difference between paying $100 at the pharmacy vs. $1 with us.
We believe that controlled substances, both narcotics (Lortab, Oxycontin, Percocet, Vicodin, etc.) and benzodiazepines (Ativan, Klonopin, Valium, Xanax, etc), have a limited role in primary care and therefore Dr. Lane prescribes them rarely and only very sparingly.
We believe chronic pain requiring narcotics is best managed by a pain management specialist, but we are happy to work with you on non-narcotic options for your pain and to manage your other medical conditions.
We do not treat anxiety with benzodiazepines but are happy to offer other medications and techniques often successful in treating anxiety. We will refer for psychiatric evaluation and treatment if needed.
No controlled substances are kept in the office.
We do not require vaccinations to be seen in our clinic. While we always encourage it, we are willing to work with individuals or families who might have hesitations or questions about a traditional vaccination schedule.
We do not offer vaccine administration in the office. We will make recommendations and then refer to the health department or pharmacy to get their vaccines.
You’ll save money in the long run by being able to select a less-expensive, high deductible health insurance policy while remaining confident you can afford the routine medical care you need.
Our membership pricing is transparent and, with the exceptions below, there are no other hidden charges besides your monthly membership fee for your care with us.
Fees you should expect to have to pay outside your membership fees include:
1) Lab tests: not included in the membership but our members have access to exclusive discounts, most labs are about $3-$5 each. *
2) Imaging studies: such as X-rays, ultrasounds, etc. Though not included in your membership fee we work with several local partners to offer affordable pricing to our patients whether or not they have insurance. *
3) Vaccinations: are not included but are highly recommended and can be arranged through vaccine clinics or pharmacies.
4) Medications administered or dispensed in the office.
(*insurance may be used)