Made in Vienna: DocTalker Takes New Approach to Local Healthcare

After a major motorcycle crash on Aug. 30, 2012, Jason Hipps was left with a pelvis in two pieces; his femur was cracked in three.   

After a week in the hospital, Hipps and his family were struggling to find a doctor that would continue care once he was released. Most doctors said Hipps would have to visit them in their offices. But with Hipps confined to a wheelchair, he and his family didn’t know if that would be possible, especially on a consistent basis.

Hipps' mother, a nurse, had heard one local practice, the Vienna-based DocTalker, made house calls. And “that next Monday they were out at my house, checking my pain levels, getting everything set up," Hipps said.

"It was kind of like everything that you'd really picture from back in the day when house calls were the norm. It was friendly, very upbeat, very positive,” Hipps said.

Eleven months after his crash, Hipps is nearing a full recovery, something he credits the practice with helping make possible.

DocTalker Family Medicine has helped patients like Hipps for a decade, a journey that started when Dr. Alan Dappen began getting frustrated by the insurance-led model of American healthcare.

Dappen says he was tired of working around insurance companies' rules to treat sick patients in his community, and was beginning to lose his passion for practicing medicine.

He left his job at another local practice to open DocTalker, which offers services that most other doctors' offices cannot: house calls, consultations and diagnoses over the phone and appointments around the clock.

There are six doctors, including Dr. Dappen, who work in the DocTalker office; like Dappen, they make house calls, hold consultations over the phone and see patients around the clock. Although the office is located in Vienna, the practice’s patients come from all over Northern Virginia.

Because DocTalker works outside the insurance system, most of these services are out-of-pocket costs for patients, Dappen says. He estimates 75 percent of his patients spend less than $400 a year for medical care with his practice.

While he sees extreme cases like Hipps’, Dappen also consults people with day-to-day ailments or problems, many of them after hours, or, by phone.

Jack Yeager, who travels often for his job, switched to Dappen’s practice after  becoming frustrated with scheduling appointments around his travel schedule.

"Calling into the office, making an appointment, waiting a long time to be seen, I just don't have the time for it," Yeager said.

Now, he consults with Dappen for issues by phone.

For busy patients, Dappen can send prescriptions to pharmacies nearby, even if they are on the road.

"It's very convenient; it's like he's making a house call over the phone. If you're fairly able to explain what's bothering you, he should be able to help you without seeing you,” Yeager said.

Some people aren’t sold on the unconventional care, either because they’re worried about going off insurance plans or because they’re not sold on being treated over the phone.

Kimberley Metzger was one of those people. Metzger’s husband followed Dappen from his former practice to DocTalker right after he made the siwtch, but she and her two young daughters stayed with another provider.

But one year later, on the eve of her dance recital, Metzger's daughter woke during the night complaining of a bad ear ache. At 10 p.m. Metzger called Dappen, who told them to meet him at the office.

Dappen was able to treat Metzger's daughter that night, and she was able to dance the next day.

"After that my husband looked at me and said 'just jump,'" Metzger said. "I said 'I'm jumping.' I haven't looked back."