Dr. Paul Thomas Talks Direct Primary Care on the Powers Report Podcast

This week, Dr. Paul Thomas was featured on the Powers Report Podcast. In the podcast Dr. Thomas and Janis Powers talk about the pros and cons of Direct Primary Care.

Janis Powers talks in depth with one of direct primary care’s (DPC) most committed practitioners, Dr. Paul Thomas of Plum Health DPC. In this episode, Dr. Thomas gives some great examples of the benefits of DPC, describing his in-depth relationships with patients. Powers also probes some of the challenges of scaling DPC, given the exclusivity of both insurance and provider networks in America.

In our opinion, Direct Primary Care solves so many challenges in the primary care system. Direct primary care addresses long wait times to see the doctor and the inflated cost of care.

Direct primary care is different than concierge medicine. Direct primary care is a monthly membership for health care and it usually costs about $50 to $89 monthly. With DPC, patients are not required to carry insurance, although most members have some form of insurance coverage. Concierge Medicine is billed annually and usually costs $2,400 per year. Concierge doctors require a premium health insurance coverage to expedite referrals and minimize prior authorization requests. In the past, our blog has covered this in depth, here.

In the podcast, we discuss how we’re able to save our patients 50% to 90% on medications, lab work, and imaging services. We buy medications at wholesale and pass on the cost savings to our patients, we draw blood at cost and pass on the savings to our patients, and we have found local imaging centers with very affordable cash-pay rates for services. This cost savings can make a big impact on folks with a limited income and limited access to high quality health care resources. We were recently featured on Channel 7 Action News about how we save money on prescription meds.

Thanks for reading and listening, and have a great day,

-Dr. Paul Thomas with Plum Health DPC