Annual Physical is for patients to visit the doctor to prevent getting sick, develop a plan to be healthy and be proactive in managing their health. It is believed physical done annually can help catch abnormalities and catch issues early on.

Sick visit is when a patient has a specific condition for which a visit to doctor’s office is required.

Many employers offer free annual physical to encourage their employees and their families to visit the doctor for annual check up to make sure everything is fine. Please review the following link for purpose of Physical visit

http://www.webmd.com/a-to-z-guides/annual-physical-examinations

As many employers offer physical visit with no copay, there is a tendency to combine Physical and Sick visit in assuming there will be no co pay. Our office policy is to separate these visits as the purpose is different.

In the extreme case of combining the visit for a valid reason, we will be collecting copay as per our agreement with the insurance company.

Copay is required on the day of visit. So it is our policy to collect copayment when you ses the doctor. We offer multiple payment options as we accept cash/check/credit card payments.

As more and more insurances have higher individual and family deductible, our office is not guaranteed payment by you insurance if you have not hit the deductible threshold. We are struggling to collect payment from patients long after their visit. We cannot sustain our services without payment for our services. So starting 2017, we are collecting deposit from both new patients and existing patients. However, if insurance pays for the visit, we will refund your payment. Please discuss with us when you visit the next time.

The price you pay for a prescription depends on many factors. It is too big of a topic to cover here. However, note that it is dependent on the following factors

Edison Medical has no role in this regard and have no vested interest other than ordering right medicine from our standpoint.

As the explanation above clarifies, we do not order expensive medicine. We prescribe medically appropriate prescription for patient’s medical condition. The payment is dependent on so many other factors (see above) that is outside of our control and knowledge.

You may also note that for most medical conditions, there are multiple variations of similar medicines. While some or all may have the same desired goal, medically, we have to make sure we prescribe appropriate medicine that meets that patient needs.

Many patients new to western culture believe we get a commission for a medicine prescribed. It is illegal to solicit or obtain any additional payment and we have no financial relationship with any pharmaceutical company.

We obtain free samples from some pharmaceutical companies which we distribute sometimes when we prescribe those medicines. This practice is to help patients who might be new to some medicine.

It is important for our office to compare the blood test results before renewing the prescription as we might modify dosage or change the medicine depending on medical results. To obtain optimal results, we restrict to a maximum of 90 days, so we can review the effect of medicine on the patient before making next decision on refill or change the medicine.

Once a patient takes a prescription medicine, it is medical necessary to make sure there are no other impact / side effects to medicine prescribed. Blood test is the preliminary process of evaluating the patient before refill.

Medically, almost always any new condition developing or current situation getting worse are generally traceable when comparing the blood results between 2 testing periods. It is important to both create a baseline and review the trend, so chronic conditions like diabetes, cholesterol are tracked appropriately.

Our office policy is to refill only after medically reviewing the patients. This is to make sure we understand the impact of our prescription.

Patients should also review the side effects of the prescribed medicine and discuss with the doctor as to how they would track the side effects of any new prescribed medicine.

Financially, while patients have a copay obligation for their office visit, it has to be compared against alternatives.