Wouldn't it be great to have your doctor's cell phone number, to be able to sit in her office and have a thoughtful, leisurely discussion about health, to have your physician accompany you to the specialist? Well now you can, for a price. Call it "the country club clinic" or "the platinum practice." A new kind of medical plan is here, and it's prompting ethical questions and legal inquiries. Critics say "concierge" care contravenes insurance rules and exploits Medicare, that they create an elitist tier of medical care, and more, that participating doctors are turning their backs on the working class and middle America. Not so, say its practitioners. "This is medicine the way medicine was meant to be - personal, accessible, engaged."
