'Fried chicken' medicine: the business of primary care

The current environment of pressures for health care reform have created a renewed interest in primary health care delivery. In most health care reform scenarios, family physicians and other primary care doctors are the case managers for all health care delivery. At the same time, there are intense activities from investment banking firms, insurance companies, hospitals, and home health companies, directed toward the purchase of primary care practices and organizing primary care delivery systems. These organizations seek to profit either from ancillary services generated by primary care or from capitation for a population of managed-care patients. Based on personal employment experiences with a for-profit hospital company, the author illustrates the difficulty in developing and managing primary care as a business and the inevitable conflict between management and primary care physicians. The article has detailed advice for family physicians to aid them in carefully examining organizational culture, financial structuring, physician relations, and operational aspects of any for-profit or hospital primary care system before deciding to become part of it.