Good Neighbor Podcast South Charlotte
Bringing Together Local Businesses and Neighbors of South Charlotte.
Good Neighbor Podcast South Charlotte
Ep. # 97 Revolutionizing Healthcare: Embracing Functional Medicine and Direct Primary Care with Lauren Lewis
Unlock the secrets of a healthcare model that's changing lives as we sit down with Lauren Lewis, a passionate family nurse practitioner from the Functional Health Center at the Carolinas. Discover firsthand how Lauren's journey from orthopedics led her to embrace a transformative blend of functional medicine and direct primary care. Learn how this innovative membership-based model emphasizes a closer, more accessible relationship between patients and providers, ensuring same-day appointments and hassle-free communication. Lauren opens up about her initial reluctance and how this practice has become the most rewarding chapter in her career.
Tune in as we explore why direct primary care might be the game-changer you’ve been looking for, particularly if you're burdened with high insurance deductibles. Hear the compelling story of a pharmacist who slashed his family's healthcare costs while gaining superior care. Lauren explains how this approach is not just for the sick but for anyone seeking a more personalized healthcare experience. From the flexibility of using insurance for prescriptions to plans for expanding services to broader age groups, this episode promises to reshape the way you think about healthcare for you and your family.
Functional Health Center at the Carolinas
Lauren Lewis
Fort Mill, SC
1674 SC-160, Fort Mill, SC 29708
Mt. Pleasant, SC
570 Long Point Rd # 230, Mt Pleasant, SC 29464
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Regina League.
Speaker 2:Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast. I am here in South Charlotte and excited today to speak to Lauren Lewis. She is a family nurse practitioner for Functional Health Center at the Carolinas. Welcome.
Speaker 3:Lauren, thank you. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 2:Absolutely on this gloomy morning. So I was on your website just, you know, really reading about everything you guys do. You have an amazing business model, so tell us first a little bit about you and how you got into this, and then we'll talk about the practice.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so we are a functional health center. We offer two different types of services at our practice functional medicine and direct primary care. And how I got into this? I was actually working in orthopedics. Working in orthopedics and Dr Reiser and I approached me and said you know, I really want to have something else for our patients here. We have functional medicine, but I really want to offer them primary care, with sick and wellness visits and just this all-encompassing care for our patients. And I said absolutely not, I'm never going back to primary care, I can't do it, I don't want to do it, it doesn't interest me. And I will tell you. You know, the more we talked and the more we developed the business plan, I am so glad we did this because it has been truly the most rewarding position as a practitioner that I've ever been in.
Speaker 2:Well, I know what we were talking and you called it direct primary care. Tell us what that means exactly.
Speaker 3:So direct primary care is a different business model and it really in the next 10 years you're going to probably see more of that than your traditional primary care. And what it is is it is a membership-based primary care, so you pay a membership fee every month, but it includes easy access to your provider. So what that means is you can text me, you get a same-day appointment, whether that's telehealth or in person. You don't have to wait several days to hear back from me. You don't have to wait weeks to get an appointment. You don't have to wait a couple days for your prescription. So it's a different relationship with your provider and what I find a better relationship and a lot less hassle for the patient.
Speaker 2:So who is your ideal patient? Then Explain who should see you. I think we were talking about, let's say, you have a really high insurance deductible and how that makes sense, right?
Speaker 3:So I talked to a pharmacist the other day and he has switched to direct primary care because he was paying somewhere close to $1,800 a month for his family for insurance and using that a couple of times a year, but then he would still have co-pays and get bills months later for labs that they had had done. And so what he has done is he has brought his insurance down to close to $600 a month for his entire family and then he pays about $200 a month for direct primary care for his family. So he still has the insurance if he needs it for catastrophic events like hospitalizations or accidents, but he gets better care for himself and his family and quite significant reduction in costs for health care for the entire year.
Speaker 2:So if you write prescriptions, can we run that through our insurance?
Speaker 3:Yes, absolutely so. You can still use your insurance for prescriptions, but all of your visits whether they're sick wellness visits, your physicals and then all your labs, are included in that membership fee for direct primary care.
Speaker 2:And what ages do you see?
Speaker 3:We're doing 12 and up right now. We hope in the next year to expand to all ages, but right now we're seeing ages 12 and up.
Speaker 2:So you just touched on something you know. When you think about making a decision like this as a consumer or potential patient, you know, are you only seeing sick people? Or if I just say, hey, I like this model, I just want to come and have my annual with you, do you work both ways?
Speaker 3:Absolutely. We're seeing a lot of both. Some people call this concierge medicine and I like to say it is concierge because of what you get out of it without the concierge price. So we see a wide range of people. We see some people that do not have insurance because they can't afford it, and I completely understand because, as a female, mine is about three to four hundred dollars a month, which is crazy. I never use it.
Speaker 3:So we do see some patients that don't have insurance and use us instead. And then we see patients that have great insurance through their companies but they want to use us because they get better care. I think in the primary care model that we have now in traditional medicine, insurance dictates that you only get about 20 minutes with your patient, and if you're a provider, you know 20 minutes is not enough time to get a full history of what's been going on with that person for the last year. So we get to spend an hour, an hour and a half, whatever it takes, and the benefit of that is people are well for longer. We really get to the root of their issues and see a year of wellness with that. So how?
Speaker 2:do you do that? How do you get to the root of their issues and see a year of wellness with that? So how do you do that?
Speaker 3:How do you get to the root? Well, time right. I think in every other practice I've been in it's been rushed. You have to review their history and talk to them really quickly and you just get this snapshot of what's going on and then you use your knowledge. And in Western medicine we really have fallen to using medication as a band-aid. So, for instance, if your thyroid, if your TSH is low, I'm going to automatically give you Synthroid. Well, in our setting we can really dive deeper and I can look at your vitamin levels. Maybe your vitamin D is low and that's why your thyroid is low, and so I can take the time to really do that and get to the root of it, instead of just putting a bandaid on it.
Speaker 2:So what is the process like If our listeners are thinking hmm, I really like this idea?
Speaker 3:What happens.
Speaker 3:You just call our office or you can email us or email me directly. Again, that's a benefit of that, and what we do is we get you on the schedule. We send you an intake form that's really thorough, probably a little more thorough than what you usually get. We want to know every nitty gritty detail of your life and then you'll come in for an initial consultation with me. Usually we'll look at the labs that you've had done recently and we might add to those or we might think those are sufficient. We'll do a full physical exam and really get to know each other. I want to know what's important to you. I want to know if you're getting respiratory illnesses every three months. I want to know if you live in a house that may have been exposed to mold. I want to know every detail about you so that we, when sicknesses do arise or problems do arise, we have a really good, thorough base to know what to do.
Speaker 2:That's amazing, and can you tell us how much it's called?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so it's $97 a month. I did a little quick math before this for just kind of averages of what people pay. So if you're paying, you know, anywhere from $300 to $400 a month, like I think most people are, for their insurance, you're looking at $4,800 a year for that, plus your co-pays, plus your prescriptions, plus surprise labs and imaging, and if you're doing $100 a month, for us that's $1,200 a year. And then if you get your insurance down to around $200, then you're at about $3,600 a year, so saving about $1,200 a year with a direct primary care and a higher deductible insurance plan.
Speaker 2:That's amazing. So I guess at times, like for things, bone and joint arthritis, do you have to then refer out?
Speaker 3:It depends. We're pretty comprehensive so we can. If I do need to refer, I'm not going to I'm not going to pretend like I know what I'm doing. I'm going to refer to specialists If someone looks like they need a surgical referral. Obviously, we don't do surgery or maybe more in-depth endocrine following or rheumatology, but a lot of what we can do a lot in our office is primary care and we'll do everything we can until we need to refer out.
Speaker 2:Gotcha. As far as misconceptions in your industry you talked a minute about, you know the word concierge might throw people off and think, oh, that's just for the rich. But when I hear what you're doing, and for the price you know, it's really amazing that one-on-one attention having access. So are there any other misconceptions that we didn't discuss? So are there any other misconceptions that we didn't discuss?
Speaker 3:Well, I think the name, our name, of our clinic Functional Health Center of the Carolinas, we, we are, and it started Dr Reiser started this specifically as a functional health clinic. We don't just take functional health, functional medicine patients, so I can take anybody. If you've never heard of functional medicine and you don't know what it is, you can still come to our clinic. We like functional medicine because it really does help get to the root of issues and a lot of times things don't need to be treated with medication. But what I like is I take the patient that comes in, I talk to them about how they like to be treated and we're going to treat them the how they like to be treated and we're going to treat them the way they want to be treated, whether that's medication or whether that's holistic treatment.
Speaker 2:That's amazing. I was on your website reading testimonials and you guys are doing an awesome job. When someone says they drive three hours to come and see you guys, that's pretty amazing. So congratulations on that kind of success. Thank you, yeah. So what do you do for fun when you're not doing all of this?
Speaker 3:Well, I moved here from Charleston so I'm actually still exploring the area. I've been here for about two years now, so I'm still really getting to know Charlotte. I live in South Charlotte. I'm a bonus mom of four boys, so we are out and about. They're involved in sports. We are always outside. They're just. They've given me a new life, for sure, so I love to be outdoors with them. I love to be outdoors with our animals. I like to read. I don't really get to do that that much anymore, but yeah, just spending time with them and the pets that sounds exciting.
Speaker 2:Well, I see the joy in your faith, so tell our listeners how to find you guys and how to reach out.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so we can be reached. Our phone number is 704-625-2994. We are also on Instagram and Facebook so you can find us there at FHC. So Functional Health Center Carolinas, and that's our email address as well. It's info at FHCCarolinas. com. Amazing. Thank you for being on the show today.
Speaker 2:It's been a pleasure FHCCarolinas. com. Amazing. Thank you for being on the show today.
Speaker 3:It's been a pleasure. Thanks, regina, nice talking to you.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to GNPSouthCharlotte. com. That's GNPSouthCharlotte. com, or call 980-351-5719.