The verdict on my new concierge doctor

I had my first medical appointment with the concierge doctor today. I have to say, I'm feeling very good about that expense. When I walked in, it was immediately clear that he remembered me, remembered our discussion, and had spent time before my appointment doing research on my condition. That impressed me a lot - not only did I see him for an hour, but he took his own time to make sure that the hour we had would be productive. He repeatedly emphasized that the treatment program would be *our* decisions, not just him passing down judgments from on high. I walked out feeling like he truly is interested in making a difference in my life, which is a great feeling to have.

He performed a physical exam (though not the annual physical covered by the program, we'll do that in a few weeks) and blood/urine labs. He sent me home with trazodone for sleep, lyrica and oxycontin for pain, and a handful of free samples of rozeram (a sleeping pill) to evaluate and use as needed. This isn't expected to be the final solution, but hopefully it will make for a good starting point. We also agreed to focus specifically on my jaws and ankles at the moment, as those are the two joints that are most affecting my quality of life (my jaws severely limit what and when I can eat, my ankles cause a lot of pretty bad falls.) He's going to look into what specialists I should see for those.

I don't think concierge medicine necessarily makes sense for everyone, but I think this was the right decision for me.