The following article first appeared in The Boston Business Journal on June 18, 2004. To return to the list of In the Press articles, click here.

Renaissance to Unveil Experimental Health Care Model

Practice will use technology to deliver patient care

By Mark Hollmer

To Dr. Rushika Fernandopulle, a combination of e-mail, the telephone and patient feedback could easily help shape the future of primary care.

Fernandopulle, along with co-founder Dr. Pranav Kothari, is launching Renaissance Health within a few weeks, a new Arlington practice its founders say reflects a reconceived notion of how doctors should deliver health care.

While concierge practices use thousands of dollars in fees to offer boutique services, Renaissance would charge $40 a month to give patients more proactive and, as the founders see it, affordable medical care beyond what insurance traditionally covers.

The largely paperless practice will allow patients easy, electronic access to their entire medical records, and they'll also be able to use e-mail and the telephone to ask doctors basic questions. Doctors, who will use wireless electronic tablets instead of old-fashioned carts, will provide e-prescription services and offer special after-hours preventive-care seminars to teach patients how to take better care of themselves. Patient committees will work in tandem with doctors to help improve how the practice operates over time. And Renaissance doctors expect to communicate directly with patients via cell phone on nights or weekends in case of something urgent.

"It's ... a prototype," Fernandopulle said. "We're building this practice to get patients involved to help ... create this radically new model as to how to deliver health care."

Fernandopulle says the ideas behind Renaissance Health emerged mostly from the Harvard University's Interfaculty Program for Health Systems Improvement, an initiative launched at the end of 2001 to encourage professors in different disciplines to find collective ways to improve how health care is delivered.

Fernandopulle himself was the executive director of the Harvard University program and left to launch the practice with Kothari, who will handle the business side. A third physician, Dr. Amy Schoenbaum, currently practicing at Brigham & Women's Hospital, will see patients along with Fernandopulle.

Visits to a number of innovative physicians' practices around the country helped develop ideas for Renaissance, Fernandopulle said. Among the additional innovations: using "clinical partners" -- ideally, registered nurses specializing in disease prevention programs or nutrition who will assist doctors by helping patients navigate through the health system. Renaissance also hopes to serve as a "second-opinion" service for consumer-driven plans such as those offered by Tufts Health Plan.

Tufts, through a spokesperson, said it had spoken to Renaissance officials and found the idea "intriguing."

Renaissance's founders are bootstrapping the practice with an initial $500,000 in seed money over the short term and are refraining from taking salary "until we make a little money." The $40 client fee will help fund the initial practice beyond what insurance covers, Fernandopulle said. In addition, Fernandopulle said, he expects to work with local insurers, excluding Harvard Pilgrim Health Care's HMO members because of their policy against a membership fee. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts says it does not have a specific relationship with Renaissance.

Colin Zick, a health care attorney with law firm Foley Hoag LLP in Boston, said patients and doctors alike are dissatisfied with the current primary care model and that the idea to forge more patient connections is "admirable." But said Renaissance must be careful to guard patient privacy and e-mail and electronic exchange of medical records, he said.

Diane Moes of law firm Donoghue, Barrett & Singal PC in Boston applauded attempts to find ways to increase patient participation in their health care. But success will come, she said, only if patients feel they're getting value beyond what insurance covers by paying a monthly fee.

 

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