Entries for month: January 2009

Jan 13

How to get preventative health care from a board certified doctor with no co-pays, deductibles or premiums

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Gilbert MD is Revolutionizing Health Care with Radical Low-Cost Solutions

Mesa, AZ – January 13, 2009 – Dr. Sam Sannoufi and Gilbert businessman Chad Harris have come up with a solution for providing low-cost health coverage they feel will change an aging health care system that is spiraling out of control. The No Insurance Club is a members-only prepaid health care program that offers an affordable alternative to traditional medical insurance.

“The No insurance Club is exactly what patients need. It is a perfect bridge to cross the gap for thousands of patients that have no insurance, who have recently lost their insurance, or have catastrophic coverage and no basic doctor visit services. Patients are raving about the No Insurance Club,” said Dr. J Napoleon Ortiz, MD of Higley Family Medicine in Gilbert. “The club is just that, a members-only program that provides affordable services for the basic everyday doctor visits.”

The club comes at a critical time when insurance premiums and general health care continue to rise. More employers are passing on a greater percentage of the cost to their employees while independent policies are generally feasible for major medical only due to their exorbitant costs and are not considered a viable option for office visits. “Health care has become a national crisis,” said Chad Harris, No Insurance Club director. “More than 87 million people go to bed at night without health insurance due to the outrageous costs of being insured. We feel the No Insurance Club offers a better solution than socializing the system which seems to be the path to have the healthy subsidize the sick and penalize the doctors even more.”

No Insurance Club members are treated as VIPs by board-certified MDs. Club membership includes preferential appointment setting, free office visits and services, medications filled at the clinic while you wait for $4 or less per month yearly full panel blood tests, no co-pay, deductibles or premiums ever for one low annual membership fee. Individual plans include 12 annual visits and families share 16 visits per year.

Since opening their doors the beginning of January, the No Insurance Club has hired 25 people for its new Gilbert location and plans to add another 40 employees before March 1st. The No Insurance Club is currently available in Phoenix and San Diego; Tampa and Las Vegas will be opening later this month.

About the No Insurance Club The No Insurance Club is a members-only prepaid health care program that offers an affordable alternative to traditional medical insurance. Individuals and families without medical coverage now have an affordable option for preventative health care. They can see a board certified physician throughout the year, receive free tests, deep discount prescriptions, free annual full panel blood work all for one low annual fee. No deductibles, co-pays or premiums ever. “The No insurance Club is exactly what patients need. It is a perfect bridge to cross the gap for thousands of patients that have no insurance, who have recently lost their insurance, or have catastrophic coverage and no basic doctor visit services. Patients are raving about the No Insurance Club,” said Dr. J Napoleon Ortiz, MD of Higley Family Medicine in Gilbert. “The club is just that, a members-only program that provides affordable services for the basic everyday doctor visits.”

 

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Jan 13

No Insurance Club Offers Medical Coverage

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by David Woodfill, East Valley Tribune
January 13, 2009

Chad Harris is director of The No Insurance Club, a new service for those who don't have health insurance. 

Chad Harris is director of The No Insurance Club,
a new service for those who don't have health insurance.

Krista Porter was faced with a tough decision when she quit her job to give birth to her third child - pay $1,100 a month to continue insuring her family's health through her employer-provided coverage, or roll the dice and hope for the best.

"We thought about it and decided, 'You know what, it's not in our budget. There's just no way,'" she said. "It was stressful but, knock on wood, we were blessed," she added. "We did not have any situations that were major."

Porter and her husband - a self-employed marketing consultant - found a Gilbert-based company offering an alternative to costly health insurance premiums, deductible and co-pays.

The No Insurance Club offers 12 free office visits a year for individuals and 16 for families, as well as free tests, discounted medication and other perks for an annual membership fees of $480 for individuals and $680 for families. The program doesn't cover things like catastrophic illness or hospital visits.

The company was founded by Chad Harris and Sam Sannoufi, a Gilbert doctor.

Since opening for business in January, the company has enrolled about 500 members and six doctors, Harris said.

He's hopeful those numbers will jump to 25 doctors in Arizona and about a dozen in California by February. The company expects to begin offering memberships soon in Tampa, Fla., and Las Vegas.

"In 36 months, we'll have 2,000 doctors enrolled, which will have a minimum of 100 patients each," Harris predicted.

Trevor Whitmore, a physician's assistant at Higley Family Medicine in Gilbert, which participates in the program, estimated as many as 25 percent of his office's patients, or 100 people, lack health insurance.

"(No Insurance Club) is for the everyday run of the mill doctors visits that you need when you're sick," he said.

Whitmore said he would advise anyone who can afford insurance to obtain it. But many people, like Porter, forgo coverage simply because they left their job and can't afford to take on the premiums once covered by their employer, he said.

Those patients have no other choice than to pay for visits, tests and medications with cash.

"We tell them you pay cash for two or three visits and your already up to the same amount of money you would have paid for the whole year (as a member of No Insurance Club). So, it's much, much, much more affordable in that sense," he said.

Harris said participating doctors are drawn to the program because they don't have to wait to be paid by an insurance company and they can pocket more money per patient visit than they do with insured patients.

He said the typical office visit costs about $75, but after overhead costs, doctors only get about $40.

"Anything outside of the package, you've got to get insurance for," he said. "I think the market will start splitting and people will get catastrophic insurance and then they'll buy prepaid preventative packages."

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