It’s almost Open Enrollment season for the Marketplace, and it’s the time of year where we all get confused about what kind of health insurance we should have.  I am writing a series of articles to answer questions about why Direct Primary Care works so well with certain kinds of health insurance.  This second article is about Direct Primary Care and how it works with PPO vs HMO insurance. When you look at your insurance options on the Marketplace, you might see that some plans are HMO plans and some are PPO plans.  The HMO plans are cheaper than the PPO plans.   Health Maintenance Organization (HMO) An HMO is a Health Maintenance Organization.  Doctors basically sign a contract

It’s almost Open Enrollment season for the Marketplace, and it’s the time of year where we can get confused about health insurance. I am writing a series of articles to answer general questions about why Direct Primary Care works so well with certain kinds of health insurance. This first article is about Direct Primary Care and high deductible health insurance.  (Of note, people with employer based health insurance typically have fewer plan choices, so it’s not quite as overwhelming, though this information is still relevant.) What is the deductible? The “deductible” is the amount of money that you have to pay before your insurance will start paying for your care.  This can be confusing because your insurance HAS to

On Monday, September 12, NorthCountry Health opened its doors to the Marquette community.  I started seeing patients immediately and began fielding phone calls from prospective patients who wanted to talk about the Direct Primary Care model and set up their initial meet and greet sessions.  Some of these phone calls came from patients I already knew and some of them came from community members who were ready to explore a new option. Later that first day, the Lake Superior Community Partnership arrived with a large blue ribbon and some truly enormous real scissors.  Friends, colleagues from the hospital, local dignitaries, TV6 and family members began arriving.  We had a ribbon cutting ceremony and I did an interview with TV6