DR. DAVE AND HEALTH CARE COOPERATIVES
Dr. Dave in front of a NYC graffiti wall on Wooster St.
A year ago I wrote a blog about a guest that spoke to our class about his health care cooperative model–his name is Dr. Dave. David Ores, MD, or Dr. Dave started New York City’s first health care cooperative– coined the Restaurant Workers Health Care Cooperative. Given the latest controversy surrounding President Obama’s Health Care Reform, I thought this would be a great time to cover this story. He has been a prominent figure in the media over the last decade. Notorious for taking in new patients with or without insurance, charging as low as $40-dollars for a visit.
MEET DR. DAVE:
A graduate of Columbia Medical School, he has been practicing medicine on the Lower East Side of Manhattan over 15 years. The youth in the area say they love him because he responds within minutes to text messages about medical issues and takes last-minute patients. Walking side by side through his neighborhood, smiles and waves greet him along the streets–revealing why patients compare him to a “country doctor”. In the public eye for years, making headlines on the NY Times and CNN, he says his popularity soared with the Restaurant Workers Health Care Cooperative–teaming up with over 20 restaurants now in NYC.
HOW DOES A HEALTH CARE COOP WORK?
An idea inspired by food cooperatives. Dr. Dave decided to apply it to health care–a “not-for-profit business” where there is a pool of money that the doctor uses to treat and diagnose patients. Visits to the doctor are free for the restaurant worker and instead, the restaurant owner pays out a flat fee per month to Dr. Dave which sits in an account for his restaurant employees. As the patients come in for visits, he takes money from the account to cover their medical expenses. Dr. Dave says this health care coop model can be applied to any type of business.
More to come in an upcoming video, including in-depth interviews with the doctor.
Here’s a slide show of Dr. Dave and his practice, he’s quite the character with ideas that are just as unconventional as his style:
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