Villages Health Care Centers
 

Very interesting article in today's Daily Sun. The next visionary step in creating a comprehensive health care system in The Villages. Kudos to Gary Morse and USF for pioneering this concept and taking the risk to see if it will work.

Essentially, the business owner (Morse?) will hire physicians on salary thus removing the urgency to see as many patients as possible and presumably giving the patient a more thorough, personal experience.

The business side would handle all the insurance, billing, regulatory stuff. The physician would be freed up to treat patients and practice medicine. Wonder where they will recruit the doctors?

First center to open up in Colony Plaza area... smart - go to where the newest residents are coming in and looking for medical providers.

Here's a link to the article:

The Villages strives to change medical care, bring back days of

This goes on the "pro" side of my pro/con list.

I'd love to have a "Marcus Welby" type doctor but I'm not sure how this would work. Ultimately a profit must be made for the business owner and I don't see that happening unless the patient is paying a fee in addition to their insurance/medicare. I believe this is referred to as concierge medicine where you pay a flat yearly rate to have easy access to your doctor at all times.

What am I missing?

Grand Junction CO has had a successful health care model for years that sounds very much like what USF/The Villages is proposing. There was a recent PBS program on how it works but I can't remember the name of the program. Anyway, you can Google "Grand Junction Health Care" to find several articles about how they deliver some of the best health care in the nation at a much lower cost than most others. Primary care physicians are the key to establishing it. I think it's a wonderful idea.

Ivy... I'm sure the business side has crunched the numbers to insure it will be profitable. I did not get the impression that it would be concierge, retainer type funding. It seemed as though it would work within existing insurance reimbursement framework. I assume much can be saved through economies of scale... Centralized administrative support, insurance processing, supply ordering, records maintenance, etc.

Time will tell....

Hmm, where did I hear these laudable ideas before?
Oh, yes, Romneycare/Obamacare. Excellent to see the world catching up with Boston and Washington!

But fortunately, it won't be mandatory.

Here's how it works..
 

You hire doctors who are willing to work within a lower paying model in exchange for other considerations (life style, stress reduction) as there is no way they will be paid as well as a successful fee for service practice. Then you be sure they have competant staff and a work environment that gives them the tools to succeed .. whether that is rapid access to consultants or a working microscope. You do not give them stock or a percentage of the profit as that incentivizes (at least subconsciously) keeping cost down for the wrong reason. You do not have an in office Xray or MRI or exercise lab or bone density machine. Thus you have lowered the cost of running and equiping the office to the point where you can pay the doctor to be a doctor and not a lab and test ordering machine. This system will work for patients who do not expect that medicine is a one stop shop where the doctor exists to order every test that Dr. Oz recommends. The people who might be very upset about this are all the doctors who have signed expensive leases for office space in TV and now find out that their landlord is going to open a competing office. Hmm

So true about patients expecting the dr. to order every test that Dr. Oz recommends. (If they had to pay for it themselves or had even a $5 co-pay they'd think twice about such expectations.)

And as for competing with dr. practices who signed expensive leases in TV....once again, competition and the free marketplace are a good thing for incentivizing lower fees and more accommodating service....and office hours that aren't just 9-5, M-F!!!

This model also should reduce the number of non-urgent E.R. visits, if the patient can actually get in to see their primary doctor at their office.

Maybe???
 

Very exciting. But I'll remain a cynic until I see results. The problem is: Doctors see 100 patients rather than 50, patients wait through 5 or 6 exam rooms to see the doctor for just a few minutes. The solution: put Doctors on salary and they sit and visit for an extended visit. The only mention of savings is reducing the number of test and procedures (???). Still, it's a good dream. Who wouldn't love to see The Villages implement a superior system that could become a model for the nation.

Please - read this article again, carefully, and realize that they are following the Cleveland Clinic plan - that the Obama administration noted when they wrote the first healthcare bill. Remember that Obama said that his plan was not the be-all and end-all, that it was a place to start.

Being from Ohio, and having received some medical care through the Cleveland Clinic, and currently having a good friend (from Indiana) who opted for his open heart surgery there, keep an open mind.

Interesting to me that Gary Morse is recommending the Obama model for the Villages health care model. Just saying . . .

We go to the Cleveland clinic when we are up north. All the doctors are on salary, They all are on the same computer system --- so my records from my internist, dermatologist, even ophthalmologist are available to all CC doctors. Medicare is accepted, there is central billing for departments, surgeons and oncologists and primary care docs all talk to each other. It's quite a system, for patients and doctors,and the healthcare is excellent.

Why the PR ploy?
 

Having spent the first half of my career managing a large medical group that was primary care focused and largely salaried, I support the concept. I have seen the quality it can produce. What I question is the big PR push. A front page announcement yesterday of the concept; a front page announcement today that a local FP group has agreed to join (as if they made that decision last night) and the same repeated quotes from Gary Morse.

Am I living in "the Truman Show"?

The model could work very well if properly executed. I agree it does not sound like a concierge model. While I am guessing (since I do not know the specifics of the business model), it may ba a provider based model in which the physician offices are 'linked' to a provider such as the Villages Hospital, and this changes the reimbursement model. Many health centers so this for a lot of reasons, and frankly, it works very well. I am happy to see the developer taking a personal interest in trying to make health care a key positive of life here in the Villages. kudos to him!

This is strictly my opinion and I am not in the medical business.
 

Because I trust Blueash and his medical background I am optimistic that this new health care idea might be a good thing.

I cannot help but note that on this forum, we are pretty good at making things political or either diefying the Morses or bashing them.The Cleveland Clinic has had salaried physicians for well over forty years. It HAS nothing to do with politics. Of course they have this health care facility concept on the front page. It is something they are trying to "sell" or establish. It is their paper. No surprise. That doesn't make it BAD.

I know one thing for sure. The one thing that I think needs improvement around here is health care and dental care. With a few exceptions we have found that they aren't as good as what we left in Cincinnati. The Villages is of course a MUCH smaller area and we are predominantly on Medicare. Not an opportunity for other than very altruistic practioners and not a magnet for those with stellar credentials..who may want to make more money or gain more prestige.

For example. I can't even imagine going to a dermatologist back home and having someone try to sell you lotions for an extravagant price. Or go to a dentist and hear that you need over 14 thousand dollars worth of work when you haven't missed a six month visit in 40 years!

Just like anything, some things medical here are better or worse than others. I would just like to find a good place to go to a doctor or dentist I can trust and be able to relax.