Dr. Doug Whitehead has been a main care doctor with over 30 years in medication.
After medical college at MUSC in Charleston and a residency within the Greenville Hospital System (now Prisma Well being), he was a founding associate of Greer Household Drugs. In 2019, after almost 25 years within the observe, he joined Simpsonville-based Proactive MD.
At Proactive MD, Whitehead cared for sufferers on the firm’s Spartanburg Well being Middle and is presently on the firm’s new Greenville Well being Middle, which opened in January on Villa Avenue.
John Collier, CEO of Proactive MD, based the corporate in 2016 to be a catalyst for change in the way in which well being care is delivered – to return the main target to superior main care and the affected person.
Proactive MD companions with each private and non-private sector employers to offer their workers with top quality care in a devoted, conveniently positioned well being heart – typically on-site to massive corporations. The result’s higher affected person outcomes, more healthy and extra productive employees at a decrease price than conventional healthcare plans.
The corporate is rising quickly and operates in 17 states and has greater than 70 healthcare facilities, together with 11 in South Carolina.
It is a mannequin that Whitehead says is the fruits of what he is spent his profession making an attempt to ship.
“We’re simply and at all times concerning the affected person,” he says. “We promise to struggle for his or her higher good.”
Whitehead lives in Greenville together with his spouse and household.
Grenfell spoke:Thanks for taking the time. Speak just a little about your journey to turning into a health care provider. Why did you need to be a health care provider?
Physician. Doug Whitehead: I’ve at all times been fascinated by folks and science. Not solely do I discover pleasure in enhancing folks’s well-being, however I additionally get pleasure from listening to folks’s tales – what makes them tick, what limits them, the place they arrive from, how they received to the place they’re, and many others., particularly once they meet their well being wants.
Tg:What offers you the best job satisfaction?
DW: Communication with my sufferers. It’s rewarding to see sufferers enlightened once we uncover the supply of their well being issues and to have the ability to present them with the answer that can get them again on the trail to well being.
Tg:Is that this what you anticipated once you first graduated from medical college?
DW: not nessacary. Drugs has remodeled dramatically over time, turning into extra subtle and sophisticated. After I graduated from medical college, medication was like a one-way avenue, the place the supplier got here up with the appropriate answer for the affected person, interval. Now, medication is a two-way avenue, the place you’ll be able to observe medication whereas connecting with sufferers on a deeper stage to search out the appropriate solutions to their well being issues collectively. Now it is attention-grabbing to see how folks’s tales, and the place they arrive from, can affect their well being points at present.
Tg: I’ve spent a major period of time working in a extra conventional healthcare supply mannequin. What are a few of the limitations and challenges posed?
DW: Conventional fashions drive quantity, typically on the expense of worth. Quantity-based fashions can result in suppliers shedding sight of the affected person’s biggest good and focusing as a substitute on the well being system, insurance coverage plan, or hospital backside line. This makes the affected person really feel like a cog in a referral machine with no actual medical residence.
Tg:In an interview with The Greenville Information, CEO John Collier stated instantly that the present healthcare system is damaged. What’s the most damaged half?
DW: referral engine. When there is no such thing as a healthcare supplier to take possession of a affected person’s complete well being journey, the affected person typically faces lengthy ready occasions to see a referred specialist, who might or might not have the ability to resolve the difficulty. They go her or him on to the subsequent specialist, making a irritating cycle—and extra bills for employer-sponsored well being plans.
Tg:How does Proactive MD’s superior main care idea tackle these points?
DW: We put the affected person first. We provide employers a customized strategy to caring for his or her sufferers, with an emphasis on high quality and price discount. We’re in a position to tackle sure systemic healthcare points in addition to employer’s distinctive healthcare issues. We do that by prioritizing the provider-patient relationship with longer appointment occasions and extra accessible appointments.
We create a medical residence for sufferers that gives broad-spectrum care and actively maintains communications with sufferers all through their care journey. We even have affected person advocates on our employees, to fulfill sufferers the place they’re and supply assets, communication and help.
Tg:What’s the largest benefit of this mannequin?
DW: affected person expertise. We’re at all times in search of methods to enhance every particular person care touchpoint. For instance, our sufferers would not have ready occasions. We deliver our sufferers on to the supplier. We schedule longer appointments to permit the affected person loads of time to ask questions. Our affected person advocates lead the referral course of – what we name the continuum of care – which takes the burden off the affected person and streamlines the method. This additionally reduces prices for the enterprise proprietor.
Tg: Are there classes that conventional service suppliers can or ought to draw from this idea? In different phrases, it is nice in case you work for a Proactive MD company or municipality, however what about individuals who do not?
DW: The important thing takeaways I would wish to share, whether or not you are a conventional supplier, enterprise proprietor, or particular person: There’s another mannequin of care that places the affected person first. Sure, the healthcare system is advanced and there are a lot of gamers, however at Proactive MD we’ve discovered that once we lead with the purpose of attaining the very best potential affected person outcomes, the remaining falls into place. That is normally probably the most price efficient path.
Tg: What’s one factor you would like everybody cared about about their well being – what would make your job simpler?
DW: There are plenty of myths on the market about how one can enhance your well-being, and I want everybody would pay extra consideration to what really works. It sounds easy, however good well being lies inside you. There are three staple items that may enormously enhance your well being: consuming, sleeping, and shifting. If all of us ate a extra balanced weight-reduction plan, exercised extra, slept extra, and paid extra consideration to how our every day routine affected our well-being sooner or later, I feel folks can be shocked at how a lot it impacts our well being.
From a January speak:quarter-hour with Dr. Marjorie Jenkins, dean of the College of Southern California College of Drugs in Greenville
Tg: What’s the largest lesson you realized from the pandemic as a health care provider?
DW: In the course of the pandemic, we have seen extra mistrust of the medical group than ever earlier than. I feel the way in which folks have acquired communications all through the pandemic has brought about plenty of suspicion and division in our communities. As suppliers, I consider we have to acknowledge the significance of clear communication with our sufferers to take care of folks’s belief.
Tg:What are you hoping for as Proactive MD grows?
DW: I hope increasingly folks and corporations understand that there’s a completely different strategy to care that solves a few of our largest healthcare issues. I want to see a widespread paradigm shift throughout the nation, and naturally I want to see the proactive supervisor on the helm. As we proceed to develop and supply care throughout the nation, I hope we are going to proceed to deal with influencing care all through our residence base right here in South Carolina. We now have 4 direct main care websites within the Northern area alone, so I am excited to see what the long run holds as we proceed to broaden to higher serve extra lives.
From Greenville Market:MD’s proactive strategy to well being care guarantees larger high quality and decrease price
Tg:I have been working within the Greenville space for a very long time. Are you from this space? What do you consider the area’s progress?
DW: I am initially from Murrells Inlet. Nevertheless, I’ve lived and labored throughout South Carolina. I have been in Greenville for 33 years now and watched it develop from a small textile city into a stupendous thriving group the place folks can stay, work and lift a household. I discover the expansion in Greenville thrilling, and I stay up for seeing the way it continues to rework for years to return.
Tg:What’s your favourite factor to do once you’re not working?
DW: You’ll find me touring or mountain climbing all of the wonderful locations round Greenville and western North Carolina. I additionally get pleasure from enjoying golf in my spare time and spending time with my two 12 months previous granddaughter.
Tg:The area has developed a wealthy and various eating scene and meals tradition. Does this make your job simpler or more durable?
DW: I am undecided if it will essentially make work simpler or more durable, nevertheless it undoubtedly makes my life higher! I actually loved making an attempt new eating places in Greenville and consider our metropolis’s various culinary scene might be wholesome normally. Exploring completely different eating places and cuisines is a good way to encourage folks to go residence and uncover their very own recipes.