Starting Your Primary Care Physician Search

Everyone has daily demands and duties. Responsibilities, chores, duties, and projects vie for attention, whether they originate from work, the community, family, or home life. But the main priority that should be addressed first and foremost is the health, wellness, and happiness of you and your family. Maintaining good health allows for the ability and opportunities to succeed and thrive in other areas of life as well. And you can start the process of ensuring good health by beginning your primary care physician search based on recommendations and advice from those you trust locally.

The importance of the primary care physician search

When you are looking for the doctor who you will learn to trust and rely on for sound medical advice and diagnoses, it can be important to shop around, considering a few different options. Everyone’s medical needs are different, not to mention the varied preferences that different individuals have for how they would like to interact with and by treated by their primary health care provider. Calling around to different medical centers and offices to ask specific questions about potential primary physicians, asking friends, family members, and neighbors in the area for advice or recommendations, even reading through or watching different promotional materials, be it online, on television, or paper advertising or pamphlets, are all productive ways to conduct your primary care physician search.

The ideal primary doctor for every ailment

Of course, there will be times that you or a member of your family may need to visit a specialist for a particular ailment or serious injury. And perhaps you may even need to make a trip to the emergency room at some point. But finding a family health clinic that best suites your needs will make your health care more manageable and streamlined overall. In addition, having a trusted primary physician will also give you the peace of mind that your health is being monitored and cared for on the most thorough level.

While there are plenty of individuals across the country who wind up heading to urgent care facilities with basic conditions and ailments due to their lack of health insurance and therefore a lack of a primary physician as well, there are neighborhood health clinics that offer family health care plans and plans for individuals as well. And while urgent care facilities have rapidly developed over the last few years to be able to handle almost anything that a primary doctor’s office or emergency room could handle, from fractures to the flu and everything in between, it is ultimately better to have that one individual or team of individuals that you know you will feel comfortable with.

The wide range of care

There are so many different types of ailments, injuries, and illnesses that could end up plaguing you or your family, prompting the primary care physician search. Some of these ailments are caused by environmental factors, such as skin cancer and sun damage. Since 1975, the rates of skin cancer diagnoses have more than tripled. And while smoking, dehydration, and lack of sleep all contribute to skin aging, the largest contributor, at 80%, is sun damage.

But the issues that are driving people to doctors’ offices, urgent care centers, and emergency rooms are not always purely physical, but can be mental, chemical, or psychological in nature. Around one in every 20 individuals over the age of 65 are affected by some type of memory loss. About 30 million individuals across the globe are affected by dementia, which encompasses Alzheimer’s disease as well. Anxiety disorders are also a major cause for a search for a good primary doctor.

At the rate the population is growing, and the current status and number of medical offices and centers we have now, it is projected that the United States will need around 52,000 additional primary healthcare providers as early as 2025 in order to meet the needs and demands of the population. If you find a doctor that you trust and feel comfortable with, count your blessings. And refer him or her to a friend.