The barriers involved with filing insurance for relatively minor claims and procedures add major headaches for a doctor’s office and you. Up to 40% of overhead is involved with claims submission, prior authorizations and reporting of data not helpful for the patients. It is not the insurer’s fault, that’s just the way the system evolved. The insurance companies are trying to remotely regulate something that is best regulated locally through direct relationships and transparency.
In an office with roughly 10% profit margin, eliminating that 40% overhead changes the game. The physician can see far fewer patients and is not forced to rush, spending much more quality time instead of the common 5-10 minutes with the patient. This is good for both the physician and the patient, allowing more thorough communication and planning and better, less expensive care. Eliminating the insurance requirement of face-to-face visit frees the doctor to use technology and relationships with the patient to treat them via better modalities when appropriate while decreasing costs for everyone. Again, it is an elegantly simple solution to restore the rich heritage of physician-patient relationships that makes medical care wonderful.
Let’s look at some examples to understand how it provides for better care and saves you money.