DOCTOR GIGI & INVENTOR OF THE SCOPESTER™

I am a native of Port Allen , Louisiana, where I was blessed to be raised by fabulous parents who provided  love & acceptance,  tempered  by an expectation  that I should lead my life in a manner that would make them proud & would help others.  I lived at home while attending LSU in Baton Rouge where I received my Bachelor’s degree in Biochemistry in 1982.  I moved to New Orleans to attend LSU School of Medicine in August 1983, & graduated  with my Medical Degree  in May 1987.  St. Petersburg, Florida became  my home in June 1987 when I relocated  to study at Bayfront Medical Center in their Family Practice residency.  I completed those studies in June 1990 & passed my Boards that same year, thus becoming Board Certified in Family Medicine in 1990.

 

Private Practice & Concierge Practice

I opened my solo Family Practice office in August 1990.  During these early years, I ran my practice, did hospital work, & even moonlighted at a psychiatric hospital on weekends.  Four years later, my practice was debt-free, so I stopped moonlighting & focused fully on my private practice.  From 1994 through 2005,  I witnessed many changes in medicine, & found my practice unable to pay me adequately for the 14-16 hour days I was working.  I still wanted to practice independently & to work for the patient (not the insurance company or government), so I closed my practice in October 2005, & opened a concierge practice several miles away in November 2005.

Unlike most concierge practices, mine was very affordable… as my goal was to stay in practice & help people. I opted out of Medicare & all insurances, & I asked my patients to come with me to this new practice. I charged $65 per month with a 1 year contract. No other fees would be charged, thus each patient would pay $780 per year for up to 10 office visits & up to 20 hospital visits. I named this practice Lagniappe Medical, as lagniappe is a Louisiana French word that means “a little something extra.” So patients had to pay privately for my services, but they received in return a physician who was dedicated to them & their health. I committed to practice medicine for the patient, not for the almighty dollar nor for the bureaucracy which was overtaking medicine.

Unfortunately, change is often poorly understood, & most of my patients did not follow me to my new practice. To keep my practice afloat I began to work part-time at Meridien Research as a clinical trials investigator in January 2006. After 1 year I closed the concierge practice, but maintained a cash only practice along with the research job. In January 2010 I opted back into Medicare so I could grow my practice a little, but more importantly so I could resume seeing my patients in the hospital.

To this day I still see private patients at Lagniappe Medical in St. Petersburg, FL, & I am the Principal Investigator at Meridien Research’s St. Petersburg office. Obviously I am very busy, but I feel a bit unfulfilled. I love to teach, &I love to help people, but I am at the age where I no longer want to depend on a building, an office staff, or an 8-5 job to accomplish these goals.