Dr. Finck was again a guest on the Healthy Bytes podcast, a weekly discussion on health matters affecting Audrain County, Missouri residents from the Audrain County Health Department.
Today, during our special week of podcasts looking at farmer health and safety during National Farm Safety & Health Week we are concentrating on the overall general health of farmers. We welcome to the microphone Mexico doctor and Audrain County Health Department Medical Director Alex Finck; MD to discuss this important topic. During the discussion, we talk about what farmers need to look out for while working on the farm and what some symptoms of things like dehydration could be that farmers need to look out for while working.
Dr. Finck was recently a guest on the Healthy Bytes podcast, a weekly discussion on health matters affecting Audrain County, Missouri residents from the Audrain County Health Department.
This week, we welcome our medical director here at the Audrain County Health Department, and owner of Cornerstone Family Medicine in Mexico, Dr. Alexander Finck to the studio. In this episode, we talk about the Top 10 Healthy Tips for 2023.
Dr. Alex Finck joins the Am I Awake Morning Show on to discuss Cornerstone's new location in Fulton, Missouri to ensure residents are able to get the same care they can in Mexico!
Listen to the broadcast on the KXEO website: https://kxeo.com/2023/07/07/dr-alexander-finck-joins-am-1340-kxeo-am-i-awake-morning-show/
Cornerstone caught my eye because of Dr. Finck. He’s a local person who came back to his hometown after medical school, similar to what I did. What caught my eye for my employees was the ease of talking to him and the ease of getting medical care. Most of my employees did not have a relationship with their doctor, and he brings that to them, which is very important in my opinion.
The savings for my employees, from what I’ve seen with Cornerstone, are kind of hard to measure. But what I do know is that I don’t have those ER or urgent care visits, and having healthy employees is very important. After going through COVID and everybody missing so much work, being able to contact their doctor when they get sick and not have to worry about paying for a doctor visit and things like that... Keeping our employees healthy is something you find really hard to put a number on, but I’m very happy with it.
So my investment with Cornerstone is that I’ve offered to pay half of my employees’ monthly bill to Cornerstone. I wanted my employees to have some buy-in, and I didn’t want to just blanket it for everybody, but I thought people who felt it was important would be willing to invest the other half. And it’s worked. I think every one of them is happy. It’s been a good fit for my company.
My favorite thing about Cornerstone as a patient is just the ease of doing business with them. I can text him, I can call him, and when I go in, it’s so comfortable. It’s just been a great experience for me. As I’m getting older and starting to have issues and take more medicine, he does a great job of explaining it to me. He truly cares and remembers everything about me. I could never do his job because I just don’t have the memory, but he does an outstanding job, and just the comfort of doing business with Cornerstone is great.
When I first contacted Dr. Finck and heard about the company coming into town, I asked if he would come out and speak to the employees, and he said, “Yeah, I'll come right out.” His willingness to come out, along with Dr. Trina at the time, and get the whole group together meant a lot. He talked about the practice and probably stayed there well over an hour answering questions and doing those kinds of things.
As far as the business goes, I offered to pick up 20% of the tab for the employees, whether it was for the monthly or the annual fee. I felt it was important to have that one-on-one with your doctor. Some of them already had a physician, which was fine, but to at least offer it to them... It’s not a lot of money necessarily, but it helps. And I think being engaged in the community and having them here means more than the monetary value, really, to be able to have that one-on-one with a physician.
First of all, being able to text Dr. Finck or call the office and say, "I need to come in," and being able to go in whenever I need to without worrying about the bill. I don’t abuse it; I don’t go very often. The prescriptions from them are much, much less than what I traditionally got from other places. For me, again, the money is important, but the one-on-one interaction and having somebody here is more important for peace of mind and safety.
Being able to offer the access and the benefit to my employees is a huge help for us. When we started offering health insurance, it was hard to pay 100% of the employees' healthcare costs while running a business. So we started with a high level of coverage, and if you need to reduce it later, it’s not a good thing. For me, being able to offer not only health insurance but also help with compensation means a lot to them. For the ones who did sign on, I’ve heard nothing but good things about accessibility and treatment. Although I don’t discuss their medical issues with him, a few employees have come up to me and said, "Hey, thanks for bringing them in. They’ve been great to go to."
Honestly, I think they’d be crazy not to take a look at it. No disrespect to the other physicians in town—they’ve done a great job—but we’ve had ups and downs lately with the hospital and the clinics. To have Dr. Finck here, who was raised here and whose family is from here, builds a trust factor. I really think any employer in town should take a look. If they’re not, they’re doing themselves and their team a disservice.
My wife and I both joined, and for us, having the flexibility to email, text, or call is great. The whole staff is very friendly. Dr. Finck gives you plenty of time when you go in. You don’t feel rushed or have to wait a long time like in many traditional offices. When you need a doctor, you need them now; waiting three weeks doesn’t work out very well. For us, having that attention and time when needed is important. My wife and I are pretty healthy, so we don’t need it often, but having access to a doctor when we need it is crucial.
The Cornerstone Family Medicine clinic will open at 500 Market St, Suite 300, in July, serving all age groups.
The clinic offers a variety of primary care services including women's and men's health services, cancer screenings, weight loss programs, adult medicine and more, said Alexander Finck, a board-certified family medicine physician for the clinic.
There will also be a 24/7 telehealth line for members of the clinic to access at any time. What a person would normally visit for urgent care or unnecessary emergency room visits, can be solved through the telehealth line, Finck said.
It is a membership-based clinic, which means there is a $50 flat fee every month for adults and $20 for children. Insurance can cover lab fees, medication or medical testing.
"While it might seem foreign to some of your readers, it's essentially like treating health insurance like car insurance," Finck said. "So, you basically use your car insurance for things like wrecks and big things, but you don't use it for, you know, everyday maintenance and that sort of thing."
The family clinic also has a location in Mexico. Many people were commuting from Fulton to Mexico to visit the clinic, so they decided to create a location in Fulton, Finck said.
"My passion lies with rural medicine and I feel like, you know, rural communities should have the same access to quality health care as larger cities do," Finck said.
Read the full article at The Fulton Sun.
Cornerstone Family Medicine received the E. Warner Williams Business Service Award at the 37th Annual Commerce and Industry Dinner October 25th.
Cornerstone Family Medicine brought a unique approach to medical care, called “direct primary care”, to Mexico in the summer of 2021. Under this system, patients are charged a flat monthly fee for 24/7, direct access to their doctor, wholesale prices on medications, cheap labs, and imaging (often beating insurance prices). Initially, Cornerstone opened its doors in 2021 under Noble Health. As Noble Health closed the hospital in March of 2022, Cornerstone had to transition to an independent, self-employed clinic nearly overnight. Most admirably, they promised all former Noble employees three months free medical care at their clinic and guaranteed their nursing staff back pay for the time they were uncompensated by Noble. Alex Finck, MD summed up their determination in one word: community. “It can be your family unit, colleagues, or your town, but those around us – the touchstones of our hearts—drive us to endeavors we otherwise wouldn’t achieve. Community – and the leaders within them – allow us to overcome the most persistent eventuality – change. Our community brought us here and is our North Star for every decision I make for our clinic.”
"Without you here, without you supporting us, and without you welcoming us with open arms and embracing us, we wouldn't be here operating as a clinic. I'm just so incredibly proud to be from Mexico, for Mexico, treating Mexico."
Dr. Alex Finck during his acceptance speech
Watch the full speech on the Mexico Chamber of Commerce's Facebook page.
