The Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs, OCPA, recently reported on the growing success of Direct Primary Care. There are nearly two dozen Direct Primary Care practices in Oklahoma, and the article focused on one of these, Primary Health Partners, to highlight the benefits of this model.

Primary Health Partners was started by colleagues Kyle Rickner, MD and Robert Lockwood, MD. In January of 2016, they, with two other staff members and his Rickner’s own daughter as office help, opened their office. Today Primary Health Partners employs 13 physicians, three other health practitioners, and allied office and nursing staff, all working in four locations in Edmond, Yukon, Moore, and northwest Oklahoma City.

What we do, Dr. Rickner said, is bring common sense back to the chaos of medicine. That, he added, brings a high degree of personal satisfaction to the physician. I believe more young medical students will see primary care as a viable option under the DPC model. Dr. Rickner said he expects DPC growth to continue and to accelerate as more patients and physicians become aware of its benefits.

Primary Health Partners is a perfect example of this growth, and according to a study by the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), DPC grew by eight percent annually between 2015 and 2017. The Docwirenews website estimates that some 12,000 primary care physicians are involved in some form of DPC or concierge practice.

Direct Primary Care is here to stay because as Dr. Rickner states:

The motivation behind Primary Health Partners is to restore the doctor patient relationship and leave behind the chaos that has become a broken healthcare system. We want to be part of the solution and no longer contributing to the problems of our system. By doing this we change the patient experience, the physician experience and bring value back to individuals and to businesses.

Who can argue with that?!