What is Direct Primary Care (DPC)?
In a nutshell, direct primary care (DPC) puts physicians and patients in charge of their healthcare decisions by removing insurance from the doctor-patient relationship. The DPC model is a membership based model for medicine where patients pay their physician or practice directly in the form of recurring periodic payments for a defined set of primary care services. Typically, these periodic payments provide patients enhanced services over traditional fee-for-service medicine. Such services may include real time access to their personal physician via advanced communication technology, extended visits allowing for better quality care, and highly personalized, coordinated, and comprehensive care administration.
So what is the difference between a traditional healthcare practice and direct primary care?
An Analogy About Insurance
Those involved with direct primary care often use an analogy to explain how insurance and direct primary care work together. Think about car insurance. Most people have it, right? But they don’t use that car insurance at the gas pump, or for oil changes, do they? Of course not, because that wouldn’t make sense. You pay the mechanic or gas station directly for those day to day services, and save the insurance for more emergency-type situations such as accidents or major repairs.
Byja Clinic’s Role
Although insurance-based healthcare is needed for major things like emergencies and surgeries, the majority of people’s medical needs can be handled by a DPC practice. General treatments can be provided by your direct primary care doctor at Byja Clinic as part of your monthly membership. For treatments we cannot provide directly, we negotiate rates with imaging companies, laboratory services, and specialty groups so if you do have to pay out of pocket, you’ll know your exact out-of-pocket cost. Take a look below for some other noticeable differences between our direct primary care model and the traditional primary care practice.
How Does Byja Clinic Compare to Traditional Primary Care?
Traditional Primary Care
- 1,200 – 1,500 patients per physician
- 15 – 30 patient visits per day
- 10 – 15 minutes per visit
- Actual time spent with patient: 7 – 10 minutes
- Cost of visit: Varies per insurance plan
- Cost of labs: Varies per insurance plan (usually billed after each visit)
Byja Clinic
- 300 – 500 patients per physician
- 4 – 6 patient visits per day
- 30 – 60 minutes per visit
- Actual time spent with patient: 30 – 60 minutes
- Cost of visit: Set price per membership plan
- Cost of labs: Wholesale prices that have been negotiated for you and explained to you in detail, prior to their completion
Direct Primary Care in The Media
Check out the video and links below for more news stories and articles about DPC!
Frequently Asked Questions
Your membership fee is charged monthly to your debit/credit card or drafted from your bank account.
- Medications
- Specialist Referrals
- Hospital, ER, and Urgent Care Visits
- Imaging
- Labs
- Complex procedures
Many of these services can be offered to our patients at highly discounted prices or can be billed separately to your insurance.
No. You do not need health insurance to enroll in our membership plans. However, we do recommend you maintain some form of coverage in the event you or your family member has a catastrophic event that may require hospital or emergency room care. We suggest a PPO health insurance plan that allows us to coordinate your care fully and will not require referrals for specialists. Many HMO health insurance plans often refuse to pay for any services or prescriptions that are not ordered by an in-network physician. In the event you are unable to obtain health insurance, there are alternative coverage options we can discuss with you that may help lower your cost for health related services.
Byja Clinic is proud to be Louisiana’s first Black owned direct primary care (DPC) practice. We offer healthcare to individuals, families, and small businesses that is timely, thorough, comprehensive, easily affordable, culturally sensitive, free from judgement, of the highest quality, privacy filled, and very personal. In direct primary care, we accept all insurance plans but we do not use it for our services. This means even if your insurance plan changes or you lose coverage, it does not change the services we will provide to you and your family. Also, the DPC model ensures we have no pressure to overbook appointments to reach a daily patient quota. Having fewer patients per day means we get to know you and your family better with fewer time constraints and more one-on-one time for your care. This will limit numerous unnecessary doctor visits and referrals to specialists.
Yes. Byja Clinic will provide unlimited telemedicine visits and two mobile visits per quarter for our enrolled patients in the comfort of their own homes. (Some restrictions apply).
- Single telemedicine visits are available to residents of Louisiana.
Yes. Since we don’t have the restrictions that come with insurance, we get to know you very well and enjoy the freedom of streamlining your care even when you’re sick away from home. Many illnesses can be diagnosed and treated with a simple conversation by phone, email, text or webcam. We’ll locate the nearest pharmacy and order the medications most appropriate for your circumstances.
Yes. We know illnesses and injuries do not respect regular office hours so you may need to reach your physicians at times outside of business hours. Because of this, you may call your physicians at times when you need it most. If you prefer, you may also use our secure patient portal to access your medical record and then e-mail or text your physician.