Primary Care
With so many to choose from – there are eight pages of Family Medicine doctors listed in Cape Fear Valley Health’s “Find a doctor” directory – how do you know who to choose?
If you’re searching using MyChart, you can also narrow down your Provider Search by location, gender and language. After taking into consideration some basic issues like distance and whether or not an office accepts your insurance, the next steps come down to your own personal preferences, and an important one-on-one meeting.
“Selecting a primary care provider is kind of a gamble at first, but the real selection comes after you meet them,” said Hope Mills Family Care’s Johnnie Moultrie, M.D. “Choosing to stay with one is different. It’s kind of like dating. You need to get to know them and you have to feel comfortable and be able to be completely honest with your doctor.”
Being comfortable includes feeling like the other person is paying attention to you, taking into consideration your thoughts and feelings. There’s no way to know that for sure without making an appointment.
“A lot of people try to make a circle fit into a square with a doctor they’re not totally comfortable with,” Moultrie said. “There’s hundreds of doctors to choose from. If you wouldn’t take your car back to a mechanic that didn’t address your concerns with your vehicle, why would you go back to a doctor that wasn’t listening to you?”
Dr. Moultrie said patients should not settle until they find a primary care provider, they can have a good relationship with. After all, this is the doctor that you will see for a wide range of concerns, some of which can be extremely personal, and who you will call on in times of need. Asking how accessible a doctor makes themselves to patients, how they prefer to communicate outside of office visits, and how full their appointments tend to be should all be questions that are discussed in an initial visit when you’re trying to decide on a physician as your family doctor.
“If the doctor uses MyChart, that’s a very useful tool for both the patient and the physician,” Moultrie said. “Communication matters. The tool is also valuable to patients who want to see test results and other records quickly. It can allow patients to become more involved and engaged in their care and can lead them to ask more important questions.”
Word-of-mouth and online rating websites can be helpful, too, before making an initial appointment. Online reviews should always be taken with a grain of salt, however, since studies show that often the people most motivated to make a review are patients who have strong opinions about an unaddressed complaint.
“I think word of mouth is valuable,” Moultrie said. “If your friends and loved ones recommend somebody, that’s a high compliment. But everyone is different, and you really have to meet someone for yourself to ultimately decide.”
On some health plans, choosing and seeing a primary care physician can be a requirement. Many specialists also require referrals from a primary care physician. But even without those reasons, every person should choose a primary care physician who they see regularly.
“There’s a lot of silent killers, like diabetes, hypertension, cholesterol, that type of stuff, where you can’t necessarily just look at a person and say whether they have these conditions,” Moultrie said. “You can have medical problems and you can feel normal, and then have a ‘surprise’ event after a prolonged period of time, like a stroke. There’s a lot of screenings that need to be done, and your family doctor can help you with that.”
Just having a standing relationship with a doctor who knows what your mental and physical baselines are for things, as well as your medical history, can help catch and prevent emerging issues.
“We see the normal you, and can know when things have changed,” Moultrie said. “That can help expedite care. I really don’t think there’s a better investment you can make than investing in yourself. Having a primary care physician can definitely extend your life. There are all sorts of things people might blow off, but they can be major clues to other things. The first step to building that relationship is for the patient to be comfortable being forthright and honest with their doctor.”
Breakout box/sidebar:
How to use MyChart to make an appointment with a new primary care physician
- Log in to the MyChart app or website (https://mychart.capefearvalley.com/)
- Under the Menu, choose “Schedule an appointment”
- Select “Find a new provider”
- Select “Family Medicine”
- Select “New Patient Appointment”
- Choose a location
- Select an available time
- Verify your information and schedule your appointment
