Business & Finance
Michigan school districts partner with direct primary care provider to curb health costs
Three districts are paying monthly fees to offer staff free clinic visits and medications, aiming to lower emergency room visits and healthcare expenses.
The short version
- Three Michigan school districts—Corunna, Lansing, and Van Buren—have partnered with direct primary care provider Plum Health to give employees free primary care and medications.
- The districts pay monthly per-employee membership fees to allow staff to bypass traditional insurance copays, deductibles, and out-of-pocket prescription costs.
- School officials hope the initiative will cut overall healthcare costs by reducing emergency room and urgent care visits, while also serving as a recruitment tool.
- Critics and medical observers note that direct care physicians maintain much smaller patient rosters, which could exacerbate broader primary care shortages.
Key facts
- Corunna Public Schools pays $90 monthly for each of its 255 employees to access a primary care clinic hosted on its campus.[Associated Press]
- Employees and their families utilizing the direct care clinic incur no copays, deductibles, or out-of-pocket costs for prescription medications.[Associated Press]
- According to the American Academy of Family Physicians, direct primary care doctors average roughly 400 patients compared to 2,500 for traditional primary care physicians.[Associated Press]
- Aon projections estimate national employer health care costs will rise 9.5% next year to over $19,000 per employee.[Associated Press]
What remains uncertain
- It remains unverified whether providing free direct primary care will successfully generate net savings by reducing expensive hospital and emergency room visits for the school districts.[Associated Press]