Introduction

Evergreen DPC

Evergreen Primary Care in Saint Paul, MN opened its doors in October 2021, offering the community a direct primary care model designed to provide affordable, high-quality care without the constraints and complexity of health insurance. Patients pay a monthly fee directly to the practice. They can schedule as many appointments as they need and enjoy direct communication with Evergreen doctors.

Like most new practices in their early days, Evergreen only had a few patients. Doctors would handle clerical tasks such as scheduling, referrals, records requests, and prior authorizations to keep costs low. As patient numbers increased, doctors started spending more time on clerical tasks, which began to slow the growth of the practice.

"One of our core principles is that our patients aren't on an assembly line," said Dr. Leslie Surbeck, co-founder of Evergreen Primary Care. "Everything we do is very personalized. Our minimum appointment is 30 minutes, and our doctors handle most blood draws and vitals. As the practice grew, we had less and less time for clerical tasks."

HIPAA-Certified Healthcare Virtual Assistant Shoulders Clerical Burden

Dr. Surbeck attended a Spruce webinar that featured snapscale discussing the benefits of healthcare virtual assistants. Although the Evergreen team was aware of offshore virtual assistant services, they had concerns about HIPAA regulations and patient privacy. snapscale's operational model put Dr. Surbeck's mind at ease.

Unfortunately, the first healthcare virtual assistant fell short of expectations. snapscale quickly found a more experienced professional who has had a tremendous impact on the Evergreen practice. The virtual assistant started on a part-time basis because Evergreen wasn't ready for a full-time commitment, but they can add hours as the practice continues to grow.

“Our clients have been requiring more of us and at sharper costs,” said Josh Sesser, Associate Vice President, Business Management at Swim USA. “Hiring another person in New York would have come at a pretty steep premium. Quite frankly, we didn’t have the budget to do that. With increasing costs across the board and other pressures in the market, something had to give.”

"Virtual assistants use snapscale equipment and are HIPAA-certified. snapscale manages compliance."

"We didn't need someone in person, and I liked the fact that snapscale had a facility where their virtual assistants worked," Dr. Surbeck said. "Virtual assistants use snapscale equipment and are HIPAA-certified. The company manages compliance. Other companies set you up with an individual, but that person is responsible for their own HIPAA compliance. That was a big reason why we chose snapscale."

"Tess has been amazing," Dr. Surbeck said. "She got up to speed quickly on our electronic medical records software and the Spruce healthcare communication platform. She helps with billing, referrals, prior authorizations, filing, managing faxes, and general organization so our doctors can focus on treating patients. And she genuinely cares about her work and patient outcomes."

The Results: More Time Spent With Patients, More Room for Growth

Offloading non-medical tasks from doctors to a healthcare virtual assistant paid dividends quickly for Evergreen Primary Care. In addition to freeing up doctors to devote more time to patient care, doctors have enjoyed better work-life balance because they don't have to spend extra hours on clerical work.

Since partnering with snapscale in early 2023, Evergreen has been able to significantly increase the number of patients and appointments. They added a new virtual physician to the practice in May of 2024 and expect to welcome another in the fall.

Find out more

Find out more about Virtual Assistants (VAs) and Healthcare Virtual Assistants (HVAs) on our Virtual Assistant Services page.