Linkedin
By Sunita Mishra MD, Chief Medical Officer of
Care Medical
June 9, 2022
Key messages
by Joaquim Cardoso MSc.
Modern Health and Tech
Research and Strategy Institute
June 9, 2022
What is the purpose of Care Medical?
- I joined Care Medical to pursue the dream of building a healthcare delivery system that works better for both patients and primary care physicians.
How the care model was designed?
- We began engineering a team-based approach to primary care to offer patients both convenience and continuity.
- Patients get a team of clinicians suited to their needs.
- The teams at Care Medical are made up of doctors, nurse practitioners, and nurses.
- No matter when or where a patient contacts us, Care Medical teams know who they are, what treatments they need, and which medications they need or are already taking.
What are the services offered?
- As virtual primary care providers, we can offer a greater scope of services as we are able to deliver care and diagnostic testing directly to the home.
- We can also coordinate care across patients’ treatment plans and provide follow ups, so plans are followed to resolution and treatments for chronic illness are maintained.
- And it’s a model that we believe can scale and also drive meaningful patient engagement.
What is the value proposition?
- I believe that it is possible to work in a system where primary care providers partner with their patients to create health rather than just manage illness.
- I have hope for a future where primary care clinicians can sustain their practices both emotionally and financially.
Reimagining Primary Care @ Care Medical (US)
Linkedin
By Sunita Mishra MD, Chief Medical Officer of
Care Medical
June 9, 2022
The state of primary care is unhealthy in our country.
Physician burnout has been a topic of concern for quite some time, but the onset of the pandemic has brought the issue to the fore.
More and more clinicians have symptoms of burnout, and many are leaving the profession as a result.
Primary care providers are a group where it is particularly common.
Patients today are unable to get care in a way that makes sense and clinicians feel like they are being squeezed.
Time, an incredibly precious commodity, is often wasted, only to be replaced with frustration for both patients and physicians.
Physicians often feel that the system is stacked against them with the focus on provider productivity and downstream referral generation.
It feels more like a sick care system rather than one in which wellness is the desired outcome.
For many years, I worked at large hospitals where I focused my work on improving access to care for patients.
My goal was to create a model of care where patients had meaningful interactions with their providers and physicians could connect with their patients the way they imagined it would be when they went through medical school.
I believed that technology and process improvement was the key to creating this new reality.
I believed that technology and process improvement was the key to creating this new reality.
Technology in the healthcare setting for the past two decades has meant using an electronic medical record (EMR) instead of paper charts.
Clinician workflows were built around the EMR, turning clinicians into data-entry machines and disconnecting them from their patients.
There was a fear of change among primary care clinicians who were unable to see the value of technology and innovation.
I lost hope that a legacy healthcare system could fundamentally rebuild the primary care experience for their patients or their clinicians.
When I was approached to lead Care Medical, it represented an opportunity to change the system from the outside.
Clinician workflows were built around the EMR, turning clinicians into data-entry machines and disconnecting them from their patients.
I joined Care Medical to pursue the dream of building a healthcare delivery system that works better for both patients and primary care physicians.
We began engineering a team-based approach to primary care to offer patients both convenience and continuity.
Patients get a team of clinicians suited to their needs.
We began engineering a team-based approach to primary care to offer patients both convenience and continuity.
Patients get a team of clinicians suited to their needs.
The teams at Care Medical are made up of doctors, nurse practitioners, and nurses.
No matter when or where a patient contacts us, Care Medical teams know who they are, what treatments they need, and which medications they need or are already taking.
No matter when or where a patient contacts us, Care Medical teams know who they are, what treatments they need, and which medications they need or are already taking.
The team approach to primary care is designed to be convenient, flexible and to take a patient’s care forward at every visit.
Our clinicians are given the bandwidth to go above and beyond by probing to get a whole-person view-a more human view of their patients.
A great example of this is a patient who came in for a routine COVID-19 test.
- The clinician, in obtaining a history and getting to know the patient, uncovered symptoms of depression that had been reactivated.
- Our clinician was able to talk to the patient and advise her of behavioral health resources available to her.
- This shows the beauty of a holistic approach to virtual and in-person healthcare that our Care Medical clinicians are empowered to take.
As virtual primary care providers, we can offer a greater scope of services as we are able to deliver care and diagnostic testing directly to the home.
We can also coordinate care across patients’ treatment plans and provide follow ups, so plans are followed to resolution and treatments for chronic illness are maintained.
We are seeing incredibly positive feedback from our work to date that shows we can address patient needs in this personalized fashion.
And it’s a model that we believe can scale and also drive meaningful patient engagement.
We can also coordinate care across patients’ treatment plans and provide follow ups, so plans are followed to resolution and treatments for chronic illness are maintained.
Interestingly, we are seeing, even at this early stage, the return to prominence of primary care as the focal point for the patient wellness journey.
We are both reintroducing and introducing primary care as an important part of healthcare to audiences that-due to a whole host of reasons from cost opacity, friction-filled patient experiences, and lengthy appointment wait times-have abandoned it or never even had a primary care physician.
We are both reintroducing and introducing primary care as an important part of healthcare to audiences that-due to a whole host of reasons from cost opacity, friction-filled patient experiences, and lengthy appointment wait times-have abandoned it or never even had a primary care physician.
But there is much work to do.
My goal is to create a home for a new generation of physicians who are looking for a new way of doing things.
Doctors who are comfortable with and can navigate the technology needed to provide better, more holistic, and faster care to patients.
To accomplish this, we are paying particular attention to our clinician experience.
We have an experience leader whose entire job it is to think about the clinician experience, day in and day out.
We have implemented regular engagement surveys and want to ensure we don’t burn out the next generation of clinicians.
My goal is to make Care Medical the best place primary care physicians have ever practiced medicine.
My goal is to make Care Medical the best place primary care physicians have ever practiced medicine.
There were times over my career where I doubted that we could change the way healthcare is delivered or that we could stop the flood of doctors leaving primary care jobs.
Over my time at Care Medical, those doubts have been eased.
I believe that it is possible to work in a system where primary care providers partner with their patients to create health rather than just manage illness.
I have hope for a future where primary care clinicians can sustain their practices both emotionally and financially.
With professional flexibility built into the Care Medical model, I envision more medical students choosing primary care and viewing it as the cornerstone of the patient’s journey to health and wellness.
I believe that it is possible to work in a system where primary care providers partner with their patients to create health rather than just manage illness.
Patients have better outcomes when their problems and concerns are resolved quicker and when care comes directly to them, where and when they need it.
When that is true, excessive cost and access barriers are replaced by fair cost and equitable access.
I hope that as our success grows, other healthcare delivery systems can follow our model to the ultimate satisfaction of both patients and physicians.
Louis Pasteur once said that “chance favors the prepared mind.”I would add that change also favors those who embrace it.
We’ve engaged in an effort to change healthcare delivery.
Not only are we prepared for it, but we are energized by the power of our conviction to make it happen.
Originally published at https://www.linkedin.com.
