Feeling panicked when your child gets sick after hours?
You’re not alone. It’s two in the morning and your toddler has a fever, a rash or is in distress. Now what? When it comes to pediatric care, the standard system doesn’t work for busy families who need flexible care.
Why is that?
A recent University of Michigan poll found that parents can only expect to get a same-day appointment with their child’s pediatrician about 50% of the time. So parents who can’t get an appointment are forced to suffer through urgent care clinics and waiting rooms full of sick children.
Ugh.
But there’s a better way.
In this article, we’re diving into:
- How Concierge Pediatrics is Different
- Why 24/7 Physician Access is Important
- The Concierge Pediatrics Model: What Families Can Expect
- Concierge Care: Is It the Right Choice for Your Family?
How Concierge Pediatrics is Different from Traditional Pediatric Care
A concierge pediatrician runs their practice on a membership-based model that’s designed around access and personalized attention. In practice, this usually means your child’s doctor limits their patient load, focusing on quality and long-term care over volume.
Sounds promising, right?
Standard pediatric practices often take on hundreds of patients. Not anymore.
With the pediatrician shortage and rising workload, even more practices are pivoting to smaller roster sizes. Concierge practices limit their practices to a maximum of a few hundred families to ensure access.
For parents, this means:
- Having direct access to your child’s doctor by phone or text
- Being able to get same- or next-day appointments
- Spending more time with your doctor and no more rushed 15-minute visits
It’s a game-changer.
With a concierge pediatric practice, you and your child gain access to your doctor in a way that was standard before, just not anymore. At a cost of several hundred to a few thousand dollars annually, families pay a membership fee in exchange for more time with their physician, convenient appointments and advanced care.
Why 24/7 Access to Your Child’s Physician is Important
Let’s get into what’s really meaningful for most families…
Peace of mind in the middle of the night.
Imagine your child wakes up at 3 AM. They’re flushed and spiking a fever, struggling to breathe, covered in a rash or just inconsolable. You don’t want to call your pediatric office’s generic nurse hotline and listen to options.
You want to talk to your child’s doctor. The one you know. The one who can reference your child’s medical history and your family’s particular needs.
With concierge pediatricians, you can do just that.
Here’s how: Most concierge medical practices offer 24/7 phone or video access to your child’s physician (or a trusted colleague). You have access to your doctor when you need them. Not “tomorrow” or “next week.” You need help now.
No more rush-hour traffic in crowded waiting rooms.
Traditional pediatric practices are often weeks out from seeing new patients for non-emergency needs. And that’s not even accounting for emergencies or sick visits.
If your child has an ear infection that keeps getting worse or a strange mole that just keeps growing, would you rather wait to see your pediatrician or get an appointment ASAP?
We can answer that for you: Concierge care means way shorter wait times. Same or next-day appointments for sick children are guaranteed at many concierge practices. A few even offer in-home visits for families unable to travel.
Longer, more productive time with your child’s doctor.
The average pediatrician spends less than 15 minutes per patient per visit. Meaning you may get the proverbial “squeezed in-between” and spend more time waiting than receiving care.
These short visits make it hard for doctors to get to know your child, build a relationship with your family, cover preventive health topics and more. Concierge appointments, on the other hand, are typically an hour or more in length.
Pediatricians with concierge practices have time to:
- Perform in-depth, preventive exams
- Answer all of your questions
- Follow-up with specialist referrals
- Get to know your child and your family
The result is better care for everyone.
The Concierge Pediatrics Model: What Can Families Expect?
We’ve established that concierge care is different. But how does this model work with today’s families?
Truth is, modern parenting is hectic.
Work hours, picking up and dropping off at school, sports and activities… It’s a constant balancing act to get everything done, let alone carve out the time to get to a pediatrician’s office during their 9 to 5, M-F schedule.
Concierge medicine helps parents overcome these very real challenges.
Virtual and remote care appointments help parents save time.
Not every care need requires a cop-on-cop visit. For many families, the ability to have a virtual visit to review symptoms and evaluate the need for in-person care is a huge win for time-poor parents.
Flexible appointment schedules.
Many concierge practices offer early morning and evening appointments and are open on weekends.
Children don’t wait for your work schedule when they get sick.
Better coordination of specialist referrals.
Pediatricians that care for children with special healthcare needs often develop close working relationships with local specialists. Because they see so few patients daily, many concierge pediatricians will coordinate the referral process and help to ensure all records are seamlessly transferred.
This saves families time and frustration by eliminating unnecessary back-and-forth between offices.
Focus on wellness and preventive care.
Pediatricians without seeing dozens of patients daily can spend more time on preventive care and education. These include more thorough wellness visits, discussions of nutrition and age-appropriate recommendations for your child.
Practices have time to check in on sleep patterns, screen time limits and developmental milestones. These discussions get pushed to the side or skipped in traditional practices squeezed for time.
And the cost savings of earlier detection and preventive care is huge.
Is Concierge Care the Right Choice for Your Family?
Let’s be honest here…
Concierge pediatric care isn’t for every family. Practices charge an annual membership fee that often ranges between $400 to $4000 annually.
Some parents balk at the cost. It’s totally understandable.
However, consider the value of avoiding avoidable ER visits, costly tests and procedures and the peace of mind and access you gain by joining a practice like this. Emergency rooms and urgent care centers charge easily several times more than a yearly membership for what is often less personalized care.
Consider, too, the time savings for parents.
It’s no secret that the pediatric medicine system is buckling under pressure. Shortages of new doctors entering pediatrics mean it’s likely to get worse before it gets better.
Parents know this. For some, joining a practice like this makes sense. For others, especially larger families, high-risk children or those with chronic conditions that require frequent care, the concierge model can help families save money and receive more preventive care.
The market reflects these trends. In 2024, the concierge medicine industry in the US alone topped $7.35 billion. Market research estimates that the industry will continue to grow rapidly. Pediatrics is one of the fastest-growing segments of the market as more families look for a way out of traditional pediatric practices.
More families than ever are discovering the difference personalized pediatric care can make.
Final Thoughts: Don’t Settle for Less Than Accessible Pediatric Care
Kids get sick. They need shots and annual check-ups. Pediatric medicine is not a new field, nor are the care needs it covers.
Pediatrician shortages are real. Wait times are getting longer. Care is becoming more fragmented as families are pushed to and from emergency rooms, overworked and stressed out pediatricians and urgent care clinics.
There’s a better way.
If you value the ability to access your child’s doctor when they need it, receive more time with your child’s pediatrician and want your family to receive the type of care most families could only access a few decades ago, concierge pediatricians might be the answer.
Is it the perfect model? No.
But if you are looking for a healthcare partner as opposed to just a service provider, if you want to establish a real relationship with your child’s pediatrician and your family is ready to stop the endless game of wait-and-see for making that appointment.
Concierge care is one of the best solutions out there.
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