We’re not waiting for political things to happen,” says Morgan Butler, membership services community organizer for Patient Physician Cooperatives Portland. “We’re creating our own thing, which seems to work a lot better and a lot faster.
“We want people to know they can have a primary care provider right now. And they won’t have to wait months for an appointment.”
Patient Physician Cooperatives Portland (PPCPdx) is not an insurance policy. It is a nonprofit that brings together physicians and patients outside of the traditional insurance model. To join the co-operative, patients pay $18 a month.
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Just seven months old, PPCPdx is up and running with 30 health care providers and 80 members. On the providers list, so far, are two medical doctors and two family nurse practitioners, along with chiropractors and naturopathic doctors, acupuncturists and massage therapists.
Carr says most doctors haven’t yet heard about the co-op; word is just beginning to spread in medical circles. She was keen to sign up as a provider because she already sees many patients who have no insurance and pay cash for services.
“It made a lot of sense to me to sign up with this plan,” she says. “It’s a pretty reasonable model of care. When I was starting out I thought a lot about how I wanted to practice, and this fits nicely with giving providers work and giving patients a good opportunity for access to health care.”
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Former health industry executive Don McCormick launched Patient Physicians Cooperatives in Houston, Texas, 8 years ago. After working with physicians groups for 40 years, he agreed to help a clinic reorganize, and came up with the idea of a co-op. The Houston co-op now offers services from 49 diverse doctors. And in Hickory, N.C., the Apollo Healthcare Cooperative, opened in 2009, has grown to 600 members and offers a seven-day a week urgent care clinic.
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Size matters, however, when it comes to what the co-ops can offer. The Houston co-op has partnered with hospitals, an imaging center and specialists, as well as with individual doctors. It also offers a low cost insurance that covers hospital care.
Portland’s co-op needs to add members so it can offer these kinds of valuable extra benefits, Butler says.
Low-cost legal services are available now, and other optional extras can be added, as the number of members grows.
“I’d like to have 300 members signed up, because at that point we can do a whole lot more,” he said. “We have a lot more buying power and people will start coming to us.”
Butler says he gets a lot of questions about how co-ops work, when people get a serious illness such as cancer.
“If you do get cancer, we will advocate for you to get Medicare rates for your treatment,” he says. “We can help you apply to state of the art cancer centers, like the Anderson Clinic in Houston. And if you are signed up with a primary care provider, you will have a far more personal care experience.”
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Butler sees the co-op as a good step toward making medical care available to everyone. “Some people say they won’t get involved with anything less than a single-payer system, he said. “But anyone who knows how health care is set up, knows that we couldn’t put in a single-payer system tomorrow if we wanted to. Patient/Physician Cooperatives can be part of that transition. We are definitely part of the solution.”
http://theskanner.com/article/New-Health-Care-Model-Makes-Doctors-Visits-Prescriptions-Affordable-for-Uninsured-2012-02-13
Hat tip: The Skanner/ ppcpdxcoop.org
Editorial Note: This legal framework was created outside the provisions of the ACA.
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