[NPInfo] House calls

[Carla Anderson]

Very good points. This one younger patient does not have a car. But neither she nor her mother are very chatty. I have one other semi older patient in her 60's (not that old) but she cannot drive, and she has a lot of health problems. However, although she and I are friendly, she really respects my time. 
   
  There is a doctor I know who does only housecalls for a living.  The only "insurance" she takes is Medicare, but all of the rest of her visits are fee for service, and she charges 150.00 for about 30 minutes, and more or less in increments. Her lowest price is 100.00, but her patients are very happy with her, and she sees about 10 patients a week to support her well. 

Christine Smith <chrisbsmith at mindspring.com> wrote:
  House calls are a great service to offer and a good way to increase income.
I did them for a practice for several years and met some of my dearest
patients that way. You can also (or at least use to be able to) bill at a
higher rate for house calls if the patient is homebound.



However, if you are very chatty housecalls can be very time consuming. It
can be difficult to get away from the patients - you are not in and out of
there quickly and they are indeed time consuming. This is why a home health
nurse rarely sees more than 6-8 patients per day. Hard to make much money
that way.



I think, that if one wants to make a decent living doing housecalls, they
need a very streamlined approach - almost like the emergency plumber. Get
in, get out. Don't track in any mud, don't admire the painting on the
wall, don't get caught up in conversation with other family. Watch your
time. 



If I did housecalls again, I'd gear them to busy executives, not elderly or
people who don't want to leave their house. 

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Carla R. Anderson, FNP-C
  Healing Presence Family Practice, PC  
  carla_rayne at yahoo.com
  503 819 9726