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Why An Online Medical Practice Is Often Better Than a Physical Clinic · Doctor Turned Health Coach

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  Today let's talk about why I chose to design my medical practice as a virtual
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  medical practice and not an in-person medical practice.
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  So probably after the pandemic many of us became familiar with this idea of
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  like okay you can you can do your visits online and I would say that most of
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  us are still sort of in that we're teeter-tottering.
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  We're not quite sure which one's good which one we prefer, most of us probably
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  prefer to be in person seeing our doctor physically.
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  But at the same time, I think the logistics of getting in your car,
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  driving, waiting, parking, traffic.
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  Then finding your way to the clinic and talking to the front desk person,
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  waiting to be taken to the back, getting your vitals checked,
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  getting put into the exam room, waiting for the doctor to come in.
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  All of that is, I don't know, in some ways sort of frustrating.
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  And in some ways, it's a bit wasteful. And unfortunately, in some other ways,
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  it can also be a bit dangerous now with many infections, people coming in for
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  a cough and a cold, another person coming in for pneumonia, for tuberculosis.
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  And in a globalized country that we have, in a globalized world that we have,
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  when you're in a waiting room, you're exposed to a lot of different things.
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  Not to scare anyone, of course. A lot of clinics will take a lot of precautions for these things.
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  We offer masks to people who are sick, and we try to get people who are very
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  sick to encourage them to do phone appointments when possible so that we can triage them first.
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  But it doesn't always happen the way we want it to.
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  The advantage of an online practice, what I've always loved about an online
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  medical practice, and I've been involved online seeing patients since 2016.
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  I started quite a long time ago.
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  Probably the biggest thing is that I don't have the cost of running a physical practice.
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  And a physical practice, you would think it's simple.
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  But just the licensing and fees and the permitting from the city to get that
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  physical space is astronomical.
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  And unfortunately, that's the cost that we pass down to patients.
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  On top of that, there is the lease.
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  There is the utilities. There is all the staff that I would have to employ for
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  that. And of course, I have staff.
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  For my online medical practice, but it's a very different way.
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  The logistics are easier. If somebody's sick and they're relatively feeling
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  okay, they can still run my practice for me, help me run my practice.
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  She can talk to patients, arrange schedules.
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  It's not the same in person. So all those costs that we end up having to pass
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  down to patients, it actually translates into seeing more patients per hour
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  so that we can make our overhead pay for malpractice.
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  The online medical practice is more flexible.
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  I have patients who travel. They never thought that they would be traveling
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  and needing to talk to a doctor, and all of a sudden they're like,
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  hey, you know, I'm in Belize with my family, and my gosh, our kid got so sick.
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  Is there any way you could, can we talk to you? And it's like, of course.
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  You have your membership to my medical practice. Of course you can talk to me. We can discuss it.
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  And whenever it's necessary, I can send my patients to go for testing anywhere, anywhere in the world.
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  The advantage of a physical practice is oftentimes there is a lab testing area on site.
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  Once you're already there, you can go and get imaging studies done.
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  But all of that, unfortunately, again, is extra cost that gets passed down to the patient.
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  And when you don't need a lab, but there is a lab there, you're paying for that indirectly.
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  When you're online and you need a lab test
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  done i can find the best lab high quality
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  lab that's available that i can send you to you get your lab tests done and
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  you you go home and there are mobile uh lab spaces that can come to you usually
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  with a van or truck and they'll come and they'll do your blood test and they'll
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  be on their way and you just pay a little bit extra.
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  That's a huge time saver for many of my patients. When it comes to imaging studies
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  like MRIs and CT scans, even if you're in a physical clinic the same day,
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  you may not be able to get that test done that same day. You may have to wait.
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  And the advantage for me is that I can send my patients to go to any imaging center, anywhere.
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  I don't have to wait anywhere.
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  They don't have to wait anywhere. They book the time, they go,
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  they show up, They get the test done and they go home.
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  So there's a lot of advantages of having a online medical practice.
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  And the last one I'll leave you with is the time.
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  The time and attention I get to put into a virtual medical practice is unmatched.
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  In a physical medical practice, there's always going to be so many interruptions,
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  so many things that I have to juggle.
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  When I go into that exam room, I'm rushed to go out and do other things.
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  In a virtual visit, a virtual appointment,
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  I'm usually in the comfort of my home or a private co-working space,
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  or oftentimes I'm walking around the park like I am right now,
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  and I get to have a great conversation with someone,
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  give them my full-on divided attention, we get to discuss things deep,
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  and that's just not something that I can do in a physical medical practice.
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  Now, physical exams are always a big concern. Well, how is the doctor going
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  to listen to my lungs and palpate my abdomen, my stomach?
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  The good news is that most of the time we can help a patient along to have them do it.
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  I kind of walk my patient through it. Like, hey, press here,
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  press there, move your back this way, press on your neck here.
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  And that's pretty good. That gives me a lot of information. If somebody is so
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  sick that they probably need to be examined that same day,
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  I would likely send them to a local
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  urgent care or sometimes I have even colleague physicians
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  who are willing to just lay their hands on a patient and
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  do a physical exam but I'll be honest in all these years that I've done this
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  it's never been necessary to do an actual physical exam in person it didn't
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  change the way I would manage my patients so I think a time would come but so
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  far, it hasn't been the case.
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  Anyway, this is a little bit of background into how I run my medical practice
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  and how I view virtual medical practice versus a physical medical practice.