Do you need a primary care physician?

The Benefits of Developing a Relationship with a Primary Care Provider

Primary care services can keep your total healthcare costs down and help you maintain good health by enabling early diagnosis and establishing a relationship between you and a physician. When you need a consultation, your primary care provider’s services will be more accessible and typically more effective than the clinics that would be taking you on as a new patient. Here are five impactful benefits of primary care.

It’s important to know your risks.

When you have an appointment with a new doctor, one of the first things you’ll be asked to do is fill out family history and provide some additional information about yourself. This is meant to give the doctor an idea of your risks and how those might relate to any new symptoms that pop up. However, these forms don’t paint a complete picture. Getting to know you enables the doctor to respond more effectively to your health concerns.

For example, if you’re a person who has never complained of pain and has downplayed symptoms of prior illnesses, but suddenly you’re complaining of severe abdominal pain, a doctor who knows you might want to confirm a diagnosis rather than wait to see if the pain will pass.

Get support in maintaining your health.

If you have a condition that requires treatment, having a primary care provider can help you stay on track with regular visits to monitor progress. It can be difficult to consistently monitor yourself for common diseases like hypertension and diabetes at home, so regular checkups are essential for ensuring effective treatment and adjusting treatment that is not yielding improvement.

It’s simply more convenient.

Having a regular doctor gives you faster access to primary care services like screenings and treatments for both chronic and acute conditions. Making an appointment without an established primary care provider when you need treatment often involves a lot of phone calls inquiring as to whether different clinics accept your insurance, are taking new patients, and can fit you in within the next couple of months. This is especially difficult since the COVID-19 crisis started as many clinics are overworked and understaffed. As an existing patient, you can call up your doctor’s office, let them know you’re ill or in need of a consultation, and they’ll typically schedule an appointment for you in a reasonable amount of time.

Your PCP can help you identify trends.

Once you’ve been seeing your doctor for a bit of time, he or she will collect enough information to be able to spot trends in your health if a concern is raised. This can also apply to mental health. Most primary care providers today will inquire a bit about your mental and emotional state when they see you. If you start to show symptoms or feel unwell and there’s no obvious cause, your doctor can review your records for indications that are consistent with your symptoms.

Diagnose disease in its more treatable stages.

In the United States, we have several diseases that are rampant. The earlier you diagnose and treat them, the better your chances of survival and recovery could be. With early detection, you might also have gentler treatment options available like losing weight, quitting smoking, changing your diet, or exercising more. Once your doctor has your history, family history, and an examination of your physical presentation, he or she can accurately assess your risk of chronic disease.

Get more comfortable with your doctor.

It can be difficult for patients to talk about embarrassing or personal issues, even when it’s related to their health. Having a primary care provider who you know and trust can help you be more comfortable in providing essential details to get the treatment you need.

A fitting example of this is erectile dysfunction. Many men simply refuse to go to a doctor and talk about it because it’s personal and embarrassing. It’s much more likely that a man will discuss this issue with a doctor he has developed a relationship with. In addition, a primary care provider might notice a risk of heart disease or simply consider your age and ask about your sexual health because ED can be a warning sign or early indicator of heart trouble.