CHICAGO, Jan. 12, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- First Stop Health® (FSH), a leading virtual care provider in the areas of telemedicine and virtual mental health, today announced the availability of Virtual Primary Care for its clients and members throughout the U.S.
Primary care is a key to addressing many healthcare problems in the U.S., but only 60% of Americans have or use a primary care physician (PCP). When people have greater access to effective primary care, they have lower mortality rates, receive more recommended preventive services, have a reduction in necessary and expensive specialist care and surgery, and have lower self-reported poor health and depression rates.
Plus, more than 50% of employer claims costs are attributed to chronic disease, which can be directly impacted by primary care. In fact, people who have a PCP save 33% on annual healthcare expenditures compared with their peers who only see specialists.
"Virtual Primary Care can help reduce healthcare costs for employers," said Dr. Eric Bricker, Chief Medical Officer & Chief Growth Officer at FSH. "FSH Virtual Primary Care can prevent medical claims now with 24/7 urgent care and reduce claims risk later with effective primary care for chronic disease and prevention - which is all available virtually for members."
FSH Virtual Primary Care is available via app, website or phone to help improve members' health by delivering whole-person, digital-first care. It includes three key care components:
- 24/7 access to urgent care (telemedicine) for episodic, non-emergent issues
- Availability to schedule preventive care virtual visits for routine wellness screenings
- Availability to schedule chronic care virtual visits for the management of ongoing health issues.
Virtual Primary Care members can schedule virtual visits with a preferred doctor from within the FSH virtual group practice. FSH doctors are available to consult with patients and coordinate care for labs, imaging and procedure orders, manage medications, refer patients to in-network specialists and provide care follow-up. Plus, virtual visits with FSH doctors are capitated, run outside the health plan and incur no medical claims.
"We are focused on increasing healthcare access and affordability when it comes to primary care," said Blaine Barnett, CEO at FSH. "Virtual Primary Care is a natural fit for FSH because we're already providing episodic care at industry-leading rates and evolving to treat preventive and chronic care for our members will enable our doctors to deliver whole-person, digital-first care."
Using FSH's omnichannel engagement strategy, which helps it achieve 44% average Telemedicine utilization, FSH drives Virtual Primary Care usage with targeted, year-long communications using member persona messages.
FSH captures aggregate patient clinical data to augment claims and provide key usage and health trends to its employer-clients, who also receive reports on steerage to targeted employee benefits programs.
Employers who offer Virtual Primary Care also receive a performance guarantee, which ties benefit costs to outcomes. FSH is one of the only virtual care providers to contractually guarantee performance, ensuring high value for its clients and members.
To learn more about First Stop Health, visit www.fshealth.com.
About First Stop Health
First Stop Health provides care that people loveSM. Patients can access virtual care 24/7 via app, website or phone. We help them save time and money with safe, convenient, high-quality virtual care solutions - Telemedicine, Virtual Mental Health and Virtual Primary Care. FSH drives the utilization of our virtual care solutions with continuous, targeted member engagement, delivers an amazing patient experience and ensures high-value, client performance.
Media Contact
Nick Severino | VP, Marketing | First Stop Health
888-691-7867 x-410 | nseverino@fshealth.com
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