There is a new trend toward medical concierge programs in an attempt to offer wealthy consumers alternatives to stressed public healthcare institutions. Doctors are often held on a yearly retainer and they claim to provide generalized healthcare to their clients more quickly than a public facility or an insurance company doctor. You may be one of those people investing in a medical concierge program with the hope of receiving exceptional care. What you may not know is that the well-intentioned doctor you’re now a client of is not trained or set-up to give you the kind of individualized and truly comprehensive support you think you are paying for. Medical concierge programs can be located in expensive suites, with plush facilities and high-end clientele and yet they are extremely limited in what they can truly offer in services. They hide those limits with up-front fluff. Considering the financial lay-out required, you deserve better than fluff and lavish surroundings when it comes to your healthcare needs. It’s vital that you become an empowered and informed healthcare consumer. I’m going to dispel those myths below:
First, I want to define health, since this is the sole reason for joining one of these programs. Here’s how I describe it in my upcoming book, Ketogenic Cure; Heal Your Gut, Heal Your Life:
“We’ve been conditioned to see health as the absence of disease, defect, or pain. I say instead that health is the “presence” of something: Lasting energy, clear thinking, good memory, healthy digestion, detoxification and excretion, muscle strength and flexibility, emotional stability, joy and deep peace. This is the optimally healthy state of well-being.”
It is my belief that we cannot define health without also acknowledging the connection between mind, body, and spirit.
Concierge programs have evolved out of a particular kind of medical practice such as aeromedical evacuations. These are carried out in places like Africa if someone becomes ill on a safari, for example. There are specialized services providing particular kinds of medical equipment. Sometimes concierge medical organizations “diagnose” over phone or via video chat perhaps to adjust medications. However, these are quick-fix, symptom treatments. While it is sometimes urgent to address symptoms – they rarely look for and fully address their root cause.
You deserve comprehensive care, which includes efforts to completely resolve both symptoms and root issues so you can completely enjoy your life and work. Your body speaks the mind through the language of symptoms and stress. Learning to listen to and work with this is essential to both avoid dis-ease and fully heal. Have you spoken to your concierge doc about this? Most likely not because they aren’t set up to deal with deeper and crucial aspects of your health and well-being.
Myth #1: The perks of joining a Concierge Program must mean better healthcare or they wouldn’t offer them at such a high cost.
In fact, the ‘fluff’ that can come with concierge programs could actually be dangerous to your health. One physician I am aware of, who practices in Arizona, and claims to be “natural” offers special Botox Clinics as part of her concierge program. You have the right to do whatever you believe is best for your body – I don’t judge – but this doctor’s advertising misinforms patients and pushes a highly toxic product. It plays on the low self-esteem and “fear of aging” psyches of her clients to lure them into her practice. There are healthy and natural alternatives to Botox – check out stem cell therapy.
Myth #2: The labs promised are sufficient and the doctor is skilled at interpreting them.
Frankly, the basic and limited labs offered through concierge programs are often deficient. Usually less than half of what you need (10-30 markers at best) for a truly comprehensive look into what’s actually happening on the inside of your body. I want to see 70 makers plus a urinalysis. Furthermore, your doctor is trained to analyze those labs based on reference ranges created from hundreds of thousands of sick people who got blood work and then the labs averaged their results. This leaves your doctor comparing your blood to that of ill people and then telling you everything is “normal”. That’s a scary thought!
Do you know healthy and functional lab reference ranges are a more accurate measure of your current health picture? It took years of study for me to develop the skill to interpret these numbers. When I look at a comprehensive 5 or 6 pages of lab results it’s as if I’m looking into the crystal ball of your health. I see patterns of imbalance that may lead to dis-ease in 5-10 years, long before you even have a symptom. This is REAL prevention. And it’s powerful. Most concierge programs are unable to offer this level of prevention and comprehensive care because they are limited by our current “sick-care” system. My methods brake through that mold and you can too.
Myth #3: My doctor will get to know me – he will understand my unique and individual health goals and needs.
This is partially true. You will likely develop a relationship with your doctor, which may be better than the one insurance company docs offer. However, Western medical doctors and Naturopaths are bound to a standard of care, requiring them to treat you like everyone else. They will give you protocols based on those standards, rather than really individualizing care. And without comprehensive, individualized care and functional testing, there is little chance of finding and addressing underlying root causes of imbalances, never mind preventing and treating them.
Myth #4: A concierge program offers “one-stop-shopping” for my healthcare.
Not even close. They may offer a massage or a chiropractic adjustment, which can be valuable, but there are so many other modalities utilizing touch for dis-ease prevention or that offer profound healing that they may not offer. Doctors’ are not trained to offer hands-on advanced craniosacral therapy, somatoemotional release, neural therapy, or brain harmonization. Rather they are trained to take your vitals, or have a nurse do it for them, and then write prescriptions. Occasionally you may encounter a naturopathic doctor offering a concierge program, which in my view would be better than a conventional Western trained physician, but they will likely still be quite limited in comparison to what I understand is possible.
Finally, concierge programs are limited, they are unable to address important health details that make all the difference in preventative healthcare. Nor do they adequately tackle current health challenges. Health details I consider important are lifestyle (much more than just exercise and sleep), your habits, beliefs, nutrition (much more than just the latest vegan or paleo fad), hydration, metabolic functioning, sleep hygiene, desires, unmet emotional needs, sex life, any areas of stress in your life, your life passions, genetics, environment, the 8 blocks to healing, toxicity, daily routine and rhythm, and relationships to name only a few. Your concierge doctor, may offer slightly more time than a HMO/PPO doc, but he or she still doesn’t have the kind of time required to walk you through a therapeutic deep dive into your personal health. I spend 2 hours working with you, to help you transform your health and life so you can thrive in every way. I consider the standard of care you receive from your doctor to be substandard when they skim over these important health and life details. “Exceptional” care demands quality time and meticulous examination of you and your lab test results. You deserve it! Become empowered, break free of the current and limiting concierge healthcare mold and seek a truly comprehensive and individualized approach to your health and life. Asking for what you desire greatly increases your chances of receiving it!
Blessings of Vibrant Health,
Kristin Grayce McGary