As a naturopathic doctor—since 2002, and in Los Gatos since 2004—I have always operated outside traditional insurance models, avoiding chaining my practice to a “sick care” system that treats preventive wellness as unnecessary. I love medicine, and I deeply care for my patients. When insurance only kicks in after you are already sick, how is our community supposed to thrive?
Choosing a direct-care model initially made me an outlier in the South Bay. Today, more practices are breaking free from insurance handcuffs to offer patients the uncompromised care they truly deserve. Direct care restructures payment around a fundamental commitment to put your health first.
In an insurance-based practice, the insurance company is the true customer, not you. It dictates what gets covered, limits what the doctor receives and effectively controls how much time you get. The entire system rewards rapid turnover. Dedicated clinicians struggle within a high-volume assembly line that inevitably reduces complex human beings to 15-minute time slots and standardized billing codes…