Choosing A Primary Care Provider

Family Care, Durham

Choosing a primary care provider is an important step in maintaining your personal health. At Family Care, we believe our office is equipped to provide you with the best primary care providers in Durham, NC. However, we also understand that there are many other quality providers in the area and the final decision is not always as simple as choosing the provider you like the best. Depending on your insurance, condition, and location, it may be in your best interest to see a provider at a different practice. This page is designed to help our prospective new patients make sure they are following the correct steps to help them choose their new primary care provider.

According to Blue Cross Blue Shield, there are five basic steps you should consider before choosing a primary care provider.

  1. Determine Which Doctors Are “In-Network”
  2. Find a Doctor with Expertise that Meets Your Health Needs
  3. Ask for Referrals
  4. Think About Logistics
  5. Visit the Doctor

If you follow each of these steps and believe Family Care would be a good fit for you as your new primary care provider, please contact our office to schedule an appointment. Thank you!

Determine Which Doctors Are “In-Network”

Family Care is in-network with most Blue Cross Blue Shield plans  (except Blue Value and Blue Local), CIGNA, Aetna, and United Healthcare. If you are uninsured or have an out-of-network insurance, we do offer discounted rates if you would like to still be seen at our office.

Find a Doctor with Expertise that Meets Your Health Needs

As with all primary care providers, our providers have a general knowledge that covers patients of all ages, from infants to adults. Primary care is a good starting point for any issues or conditions that you may experience and most specialists require a visit with a PCP before they will accept you as a patient. From the American Academy of Family Physicians:

Primary care is that care provided by physicians specifically trained for and skilled in comprehensive first contact and continuing care for persons with any undiagnosed sign, symptom, or health concern (the “undifferentiated” patient) not limited by problem origin (biological, behavioral, or social), organ system, or diagnosis.

Basically, primary care providers are trained to assess your condition and determine the proper course of action for you to follow if you want to improve. The majority of the time, the issue is able to be handled in our office, but you may occasionally be referred to a specialist depending on the nature of your condition.

While primary care providers do not necessarily have a “specialty,” each of our providers does have a special personal interest in certain types of conditions. These are simply topics that our providers have taken a professional interest in treating, but each provider is trained to handle any issue you may present.

Ask for Referrals

On the short chance that one of your friends, family members, or neighbors is not one of the 2500 current patients we serve at our office, there are many online review sites that have some great testimonials from our patients. For more details, you can visit our online reviews page, or just type in one of our provider’s names into your preferred search engine. Our office has consistently maintained high patient satisfaction scores across many different metrics and we are confident that any outside information you receive about our practice will be positive.

Think About Logistics

You have to be able to get to our office, of course, so choosing a primary care provider in a convenient location and offers appointment times that fit your own schedule is very important. Our office is located next to Research Triangle Park in Durham, NC and only about 5 minutes east of the Southpoint Shopping Center. If you spend most of your time shopping at Southpoint, Brier Creek, or downtown Durham, our office is probably convenient to your home or work.

We offer a total of 52 possible hours during the week that you can see one of our providers, including available appointments between 5pm and 8pm on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. We also reserve at least six appointment slots every day for same day acute illnesses (ie. people who call that morning because they are sick), so we can almost always get you in for an appointment within 24 hours.

Visit the Doctor

The best way to know if your primary care provider is right for you is to actually meet them in person. Since we understand it can be difficult to schedule an appointment just to meet a new provider, we have made introduction videos for our new patients to get to know our providers and staff a little better before coming in for a medical appointment.

If we can help in any way as you go about the process of choosing a primary care provider, please contact our office. Once you have checked out our provider biographies and introduction videos and think you are ready to schedule an appointment, please complete our new patient registration forms and contact our office to schedule an appointment!

Thank you for your interest in our practice! We look forward to seeing you at Family Care!