- Overall, your PCP is key to:
- Providing preventive care and guidance on how to achieve a healthy lifestyle.
- Diagnosing and treating acute common medical conditions, such as cold, flu, infections, etc.
- Treatment and management of chronic diseases, such as high blood pressure, cholesterol, and diabetes.
- Determining the severity of your medical problems, so he or she can direct you to the most appropriate care provider.
- Referring you to medical specialists when conditions require more targeted treatment.
In addition, a PCP ensures prescribed medications will not adversely affect other medications or supplements you may already be taking. Over time, your PCP learns your health history and what is most important to you and your long-term wellness. This high-level oversight ensures all of the treatments, medications, therapies, and recommendations from various providers are as effective as possible.
Even if you are relatively healthy right now, things can and do change. This is especially true of millennials (the segment of the population born between the early ’80s and the early 2000s), who are in the perfect position to establish health and wellness baselines with a dedicated primary care provider.
PCPs are usually physicians; however, physician assistants and nurse practitioners (collectively referred to as advanced practice providers) who work under a qualified physician can also be your PCP. There are also different types of primary care physicians, some of which you may need at different points in your life, depending on your health care needs.
This chart identifies the different types of primary care physicians and can help you pinpoint which can help you most, depending on your health care needs.
