Welcome to concierge medicine

In November we received a form letter from a firm called MDVIP on behalf of our family doctor that he is transitioning his practice to a "concierge medicine" model. In other words, he will have to reduce the size of his practice to no more than 600 patients, and each patient will have to pay a $1,500/ year retainer fee up front. This will start December 30, 2008.

The letter stated that the benefits are that the doctor can spend a lot more time caring for each patient. Also, same day appointments would be possible. It went on to explain that he would like to work with each patient in a more holistic way, because studies have shown that this helps reduce hospital visits, and shortens the hospitals stays. Lastly, there would be greatly enhanced medical informatics with beefed up physicals involving very state of the art technology. And every patient would receive a CD with all their medical history so that if we were ever away form the area, and had to go to a doctor, we could see an MDVIP doctor, and just give them the disk --saving tons of valuable time.

The letter invited us to attend an event in Bethesda where our questions and concerns would be addressed. There would be four times all facilitated at he Bethesda Hyatt in one of the meeting rooms.

I went to that event with Jake. There were about 300 people in the audience sitting schoolroom style facing a big projection screen and podium. Jake was the only child in the room.

OK, the benefits sound good. I wish that were the normal care, however. It really ought to be the norm.


This is really crappy timing for us as we are recovering our lives and kind of in a very vulnerable state.

This "concierge medicine" model creates a two-tier access to care => the haves and have nots. Insurance should cover the cost. We could tuck away $3K into flexible spending, but then we would not be able to cover other bills -- several out of pocket medical bills.