In this episode of Healthcare Americana, Christopher Habig explores the transformative potential of Direct Primary Care (DPC) with Dr. Mazhar Khan from FreedomDoc at Westfield Premier. They discuss DPC’s patient-centered approach, emphasizing quality healthcare based on patient value rather than traditional metrics. Dr. Khan shares compelling anecdotes illustrating DPC’s effectiveness in providing comprehensive care for complex conditions, facilitated by unrestricted time with patients. Reflecting on his transition to DPC, Dr. Khan highlights the shift from volume-based quotas to a patient-focused approach, driven by a desire to prioritize genuine care. Christopher underscores DPC’s proactive stance towards healthcare, advocating for its adoption among young doctors to transform the healthcare landscape.
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[INTRODUCTION]
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[EPISODE]
[0:00:38] Christopher Habig: Hello and welcome to Healthcare Americana, the podcast that redefines healthcare one episode at a time. I’m Christopher Habig, the CEO of Freedom Healthworks, and your guide on this journey towards a more personalized and accessible health care system. Today, we’re diving into the heart of truly elevated direct primary care with a special guest, Dr. Mo Khan from FreedomDoc at Westfield Premier. Direct Primary Care or DPC is not just healthcare, it’s healthcare revolutionized. In a world where healthcare often feels transactional, DPC brings back the essence of doctor-patient relationships.
Now, imagine a healthcare model focused on you, tailored to your needs without the constraints of traditional insurance-based systems. That’s what DPC offers. Today, we’re exploring this innovative model with Dr. Mo Khan, a physician in this very field. Now, the core of DPC lies in its simplicity and patient-centered approach. It’s about stripping down the complexities of health care, and focusing on what truly matters, the patient’s health. I’m going to say that again, the patient’s health. DPC practices like FreedomDoc at Westfield Premier, operate on a subscription-based model, offering patients unlimited access to their physicians for a flat monthly fee. This model not only makes health care more affordable, but also more accessible, which is very, very important in anybody’s health journey.
Now, how does this impact the quality of care? A lot of times, when we talk to doctors under the insurance-based model, I ask them, how they define quality health care. And they say, quality is where the hell anthem tells us it is, or elephants, whoever the hell they are these days. It’s whatever the hell they tell us it is and its profit maximization. Since you’ve been practicing DPC, how would you define the word quality care?
[0:02:32] Dr. Mazhar Khan: Quality can mean so many different things. I mean, obviously, we live in a world where metrics and various data points determine quality. But quality to me is determined by the value of the consumer. When a patient sees value in what we do, and what we bring to the table, that’s quality. Quality isn’t necessarily hitting your MACRA and MIPS metrics. Quality isn’t seeing 25 people a day. Quality isn’t some sort of RVU-based model, right? Quality is not RVUs, and quality is not any of those things. I’ll give you an example. Recently, I had an individual join our practice, and they had been diagnosed with a very rare autoimmune condition. Unfortunately, despite multiple trips to their primary care doctor, and multiple specialists, they hadn’t been able to seek the answers, or get the direct, any guidance as to what direction to go in.
Within one meeting of coming to our office and signing up for care, we now have them set up with a multitude of immunology, rheumatology, neurology, all of the specialists that not just anybody, by the way, of these specialists. But specifically, people who are kind of the experts in their field regarding this immune condition, here within Central Indiana. All it literally took was sitting down with them for an hour, spending some time on Google, calling some friends of mine in the community, some specialists who knew some other people who might be, experts in this regard. Voilà, that individual now, after years of searching locally for people who might be able to help them with this very, very rare disease. At least, they’ve been put into the right direction.
That’s one of the great things that we offer with Direct Primary Care is, because you’re not limited to a 15-minute office visit. We have time to do a little googling. As much as doctors don’t like Googling. Googling is a great resource. It’s how we learn. It’s how we find people. Not that that’s not possible in the traditional insurance-based system, it’s just time prohibitive, or there’s other people breathing down your neck to get more work done, but not necessarily quality work done. I mean, this is just one of many kind of charming stories that we have. I’m sure my colleagues in the direct primary care world would have, regarding being able to actually make a meaningful impact on someone’s life.
[0:05:06] Christopher Habig: That was Dr. Mo Khan, a physician at FreedomDoc at Westville. Premier. Dr. Khan, a former hospitalist and long-term acute medical director was drawn to DPC because of the ability it gives physicians to focus on their patients. Now, again, DPC lets physicians focus on their patients. How important is that? Again, going back to what I said earlier, that is the most important thing in healthcare. Here’s Dr. Khan again, detailing what has changed in the way he sees patients now compared to where he was before?
[0:05:41] Dr. Mazhar Khan: Going back a little bit. Why did I leave family medicine in the first place? When I was working in Texas as a family physician, one of the things that my patients appreciated and valued about me as their primary care physician was dedicating the time needed to help them regardless of the – I guess, you could say the time stipulations put in by the company. Unfortunately, when an individual physician doesn’t necessarily meet the quotas or targets for the number of patients to be seen on a daily basis, there’s a penalty be paid, right? I became a doctor to help people. I mean, sure, doctors do well for them from a salary perspective. But I signed up to be a doctor to literally be a teacher, and to be able to provide good care for my patients. I was able to provide 45-minute to one-hour long visits for my patients. But ultimately, it was a matter of – something had to give. Either my salary had to give, or my time had to give.
Unfortunately, after several years of working for a system, where I felt patient care come secondary to volume of patients being seen. I told myself that I would leave family medicine altogether if it meant practicing in a way that, that meant I couldn’t spend the time and the resources necessary to the patients that have come seeking my help. That would explain kind of why I had that long pause in my career in terms of why I left family medicine, I went towards hospital medicine. But when the opportunity to practice medicine in a way that feels most familiar to me, in terms of less patients seen per day, but more time and education spent with them. That’s kind of what appealed to me the most about getting into direct primary care, rather than going back, and working for one of the hospital or insurance-based systems.
[0:07:38] Christopher Habig: It’s a little bit of culture shock when I hear from doctors who are like, “Oh, I was used to this thing over here, then I jumped into here, and it took me a little bit to get used to it because there are a lot of bad habits, for lack of a better word to break.” What was the thing that surprised you the most when you first started seeing patients in the DPC model?
[0:07:57] Dr. Mazhar Khan: I don’t know if anything came as a shock or anything. I think it comes across exactly as advertised, in terms of more time, and having the flexibility to really devote the time towards the patient and their needs. It’s almost a shock that so many family doctors are still and trapped within the existing model, which is to see as many patients in a day as humanly possible, and kind of get stuck in that rut. To quote the matrix. It’s like I’ve taken the red pill and I’m out, I’ve been unplugged. While it is a little foreign in the sense of it’s not like your traditional system-based practice here, it’s just refreshing. It’s refreshing to be able to see patients the way I want to, spend the time that I want to, and not be tied down to what would the insurance system, or insurance companies be saying in regards to, what if somebody needs to come in twice in one week for an issue, we can make that happen. We’re not bound to those constructs of the matrix anymore, so it’s been refreshing.
[0:09:03] Christopher Habig: Now, I find Dr. Khan’s explanation to be really, truly inspiring. Meeting, talking to, and working with physicians like Dr. Khan, it’s clear that DPC is more than just a healthcare model. It’s a commitment to better patient care. Now, changing gears a little bit. One of the remarkable aspects of DPC is the emphasis on preventive care. Instead of reacting or being available when you need me, which is something that drives me nuts when I see it in any type of direct primary care marketing. In handling issues, DPC allows physicians like Dr. Khan to work proactively with patients. They have the time and resources to focus on the holistic health strategies, emphasizing prevention over cure. Again, this is an emphasis of proactive care versus reactive care. When you’re practicing reactive health care, you’re waiting for somebody to shoot you a message, to pick up the phone to call you, to walk into your office
The fact is, the majority of Americans don’t want to do that, because they’ve had such bad experiences with healthcare previously. They can’t wrap their minds away that there’s actually a better way to go about doing this. Proactive care not only improves patient health outcomes, but also creates a more fulfilling doctor-patient relationship. Dr. Khan, now that you’ve been in the direct primary care world, what opportunities do you have to be proactive and keeping patients healthy, versus always having to react to problems or issues, if and when a patient decides to actually reach out?
[0:10:35] Dr. Mazhar Khan: I think, part of that equation is rather than a reactive system, and transitioning more towards a proactive system of health care, to quote the matrix again, as much as I may have unplugged myself from the matrix, it’s also going to require unplugging patients from the matrix. I mean, if all they know of their family doctor is, I have a problem. I know who to go to, to get it addressed. They don’t necessarily see us as you know, somebody who may be a facilitator and hold them accountable, or drive them towards a healthier lifestyle, et cetera. Because. unfortunately, that’s all they’ve ever experienced so far. I think, as direct primary care is relatively in its infancy, I mean, it’s been around for several years now. But as more and more doctors like myself become unplugged from the insurance-based matrix, if you will. Now, our goal is to create a practice or a system whereby we can help not only unplug patients from the Matrix, but also show them how to live a life outside of just symptom treatment-based medicine, if you will.
I think that’s one of the great flexibilities that I have here at FreedomDoc and Freedom Healthworks, in working with yourself, and with the rest of our team. Is we don’t necessarily have to have all the answers right now. But we’re working together to create a model that will benefit patients in that manner. I can only imagine having these discussions with anybody in the corporate world, if you will, the corporate medicine world. We’d get shut down altogether, like these ideas would be dead in the water. But we have that flexibility, because again, we’re not tied down to, or being told what to do, per se. We’re all in it for the patients and for building better communities.
[0:12:28] Christopher Habig: Again, I find that it’s remarkable to see such positive impacts from the DPC model. Dr. Khan’s experience at FreedomDoc, I feel like they truly exemplify the potential of this healthcare approach. Now. let’s talk about where we’re going. Let’s talk about the future. So many people understand that there is a problem in healthcare, and they focus on the past, they focus on how we got here, what the problems that led us here, the moral injury that occurs to physicians. The fact that we’re not treating doctors and nurses as a whole very well. So let’s look forward. Let’s see, how do we paint the perfect world?
Dr. Khan, how do we get all the doctors, nurses, medical professionals in the US into this model, or at least educate them about this model, and let them know that the grass is greener on the other side?
[0:13:18] Dr. Mazhar Khan: I think part of the focus needs to be getting to young doctors and physicians at a very early part of their career. I think, DPC has been around since before 2016, and I graduated residency in 2015. We’ve heard of this mythical thing called concierge medicine. That’s only for the elite doctors of the world, and charging super high premiums, et cetera. But the fact is that, we’re really quite approachable and affordable to the masses. I think that for the younger doctors coming out of residency who feel like, maybe one day in my career, my advice to you would be is, “Well, why not start early, when the knowledge is fresh, and the education is fresh? How can we kind of unplug them from the matrix, if you will? I think people are very receptive to it, once they realize that maybe some of the things that they’ve heard, it’s too pricey, it’s too difficult to do on your own. It’s not for me.
I think a lot of those fears, and those worries go wayside when they realize that, hey, if another one of their colleagues is not just doing it, I’m living it, and I’m breathing it every single day basis. It becomes a bit more realistic of a goal and a target for them. I do foresee that in the future, DPC will be a big part of the family medicine landscape across the country. Mostly because, I think people are just burnt out. People are burnt out from the endless number of metrics, the endless number of patients that they’re having to see without making any quality impact or delivering value to them. I think we all signed up to become doctors and dedicate the best part of our lives to study this stuff to help people. Not just treat people like another ticket in line.
I know for the rest of my career; I will always be an advocate for the direct primary care model. I think that the United States doesn’t have necessarily a shortage of doctors. But what we do have is a system that doesn’t allow us to devote the time and energy needed to help people in their health journeys. I think that if there were more direct primary care outfits out there, I think we’d see a significant improvement in public health. I think we’d see a significant improvement in people’s happiness, their longevity, just their overall wellbeing, because they finally have somebody who’s willing to listen to them.
[0:15:49] Christopher Habig: As we conclude today’s episode, it’s clear, direct primary care isn’t just an alternative option. It’s a beacon of hope. It really in my mind for a more patient centric healthcare system. I want to thank Dr. Mo Khan from FreedomDoc at Westfield Premier for his valuable insights. Now, tune in next week as we explore more stories within the DPC model, and really, what I’m going to say, the future hope of health care in America. If you’re finding value in the show, please subscribe and share it with your friends and colleagues. Or check us out on healthcareamericana.com. Let’s spread the word about this healthcare revolution.
A big thank you once again to Dr. Mo Khan for joining us today, and to you, our listeners for being a part of this journey. This episode is produced by Taylor Scott with iPodcastPro. I’m Christopher Habig, and you’ve been listening to Healthcare Americana, sponsored by the Free Market Medical Association. Stay tuned, stay healthy, and stay informed.
[OUTRO]
[0:16:53] Announcer: Healthcare Americana is brought to you by Freedom Healthworks and FreedomDoc. If you’ve been struggling to get the care you need and the access you want, it’s time to join your local FreedomDoc. Visit freedomdoc.care to find the practice location nearest you.
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[END]