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Dr. Kristen Bishop and Mesa Chamber President Sally Harrison

Dr. Kristen Bishop, Founder & Medical Director at Keystone Natural Family Medicine, joins Mesa Chamber President and CEO Sally Harrison in discussing naturopathic medicine, direct primary care, and membership at Keystone Medicine. 

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Full Transcript

Kevin
The Mesa Chamber of Commerce Inside Business podcast brings you a unique view of Mesa through its vibrant business community and the subjects that are important. The podcast is produced in the Mesa Chamber of Commerce Media Studio sponsored by the University of Phoenix. Our podcast is hosted by Mesa Chamber of Commerce CEO Sally Harrison. Please enjoy this episode of the Mesa Chamber Inside Business Podcast.

Sally
Hi, this is Sally Harrison with the Mesa Chamber of Commerce, and today I have the pleasure of having my friend Dr. Kristen Bishop with Keystone Natural Family Practice in the podcast studio with me to answer all things about natural paths. Perfect. Yes. Sounds like stuff, you know, super.

Kristen
Excited to be here.

Sally
Well, thank you for having me. Really glad you are. So tell me, what is naturopathic medicine?

Kristen
So in my opinion, metabolic medicine is sort of a blending of both worlds in a really, really good way. So we get most of the Western medicine as well as Eastern medicine. We’re trained more in nutrition. We get homeopathy, we can do I.V. therapy, we can do all kinds of things that conventional medicine doesn’t always offer. So it really is the best of both worlds.

Sally
So what made you choose naturopathic medicine?

Kristen
MM So this would probably be a very long answer. But in short, I was raised really up ethically in Ohio and had a great family doctor that we loved, but then I had my third child at home and once I did that, that was when my midwife kind of turned me on to this whole natural world that at first I thought was a little crazy.

Kristen
But obviously I grew to love it and it made a lot of sense. The more I kind of got into that world and I had no idea naturopathy medicine even existed growing up in Ohio, we had no idea that that was a thing. So it was all new to me. And then I found the school here in Arizona and ended up moving out in 2007, July, that terrible time to move here.

Sally
But hey, if you can do that, you can do anything.

Kristen
That’s right. So we stayed. So here we are. I’ve been practicing for 13 years, so 13 years.

Sally
And a lot’s changed since you started. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So is the training different from other doctors in its scope? Different.

Kristen
So training wise, it’s pretty similar. We all do two years of didactic and then we do two years of clinicals.

Sally
All right, well, it’s didactic.

Kristen
Oh, classroom. Okay.

Sally
To send some of us out here might not know that. Okay, good. Glad you stopped.

Kristen
Me on it. So, yeah, we get all of the biologies, all the anatomy classes, you know, those are pretty standard. Whether you’re an osteopathic doctor or a medical doctor, a natural empathic doctor, chiropractic doctor. Most of that’s all the same. Our clinicals are where we really differ because we have to learn all of the additional homoeopathy and acupuncture, nutrition and all of those extra things that naturopathic medicine brings in where the medical doctors wouldn’t get that type of training.

Sally
Okay, well, health experience between naturopathy like in conventional medicine, different.

Kristen
I would say the experience is that naturopathic doctors are trained to treat the whole person. So we don’t specialize. I think one of the downfalls of the medical system is that we’ve almost over specialized. It’s really, really hard to take care of people, like only looking at their heart, for example, or only looking at their stomach because it’s all in one person.

Kristen
So we have to we’re trained to treat the whole person. Like I said, I grew up with a family practice staff who really took care of our whole family. He didn’t spend time, like looking at his computer, trying to figure out who we were because he had taken care of my grandparents, their eight children and then the grandkids.

Kristen
So he kind of knew our family history. He just knew us as a family. And that’s what I personally want to bring back is that family medicine doctor. So I would say the experience is different because while people are looking for that again, they want that family doctor where they can take their kids and if they get sick, you know, it’s not going to another doctor.

Kristen
Well, everybody can be seen by one. And people who just know you and you have that kind of relationship with their their physician because it’s super important that you have that good relationship. And we’ve kind of lost that.

Sally
I think this doctor a lot yesterday, I asked somebody, So who’s your family doctor? Yeah, I got this. Like, look, it’s like, like heart. Doctor. I’m like, Well, okay. But your heart doctors not see you for, like, a stomach issue. Well, no, I would have to go find somebody for that. Well, wait.

Kristen
Yeah.

Sally
Yeah. So, heart doctor, somebody that did work with this person’s feet. And I’m like, wow. So you have a literally a different doctor for everything. It’s like, well, yeah, kind of. Okay.

Kristen
And it’s not usually efficient. Usually they’re going, you know, and then you’re sitting in a waiting room for an hour here only to be told, Oh, well, everything looks good on my end, Right. This specialist. And then you’re off to the next specialist and then room we go.

Sally
Yeah. Who’s got time for that? All right, so let’s talk about let’s talk about the the the other non fun part talked about talk about direct primary care or DP.

Kristen
So direct primary care is a business model of medicine that is kind of sweeping across the country right now. And basically the medical doctors, the osteopathic doctors, a lot of them are fed up with the medical system. So they’re jumping out and direct primary care is direct from the doctor to the patient. So we remove the pharmaceutical influence and remove the insurance industry from primary care.

Kristen
So I do think that you need insurance for hospitalization or chronic care, catastrophic, that type of thing. But we’ve found that we can do primary care so efficiently and so cost effective that it just makes sense to just take care of people in a primary care way. So the DPC model is just that we remove the insurance and the pharmaceutical industry and just take care of people.

Sally
Well, what a novel approach.

Kristen
It really is kind of old school medicine.

Sally
It is, but but as a patient of yours, I just I heard so many people through the last couple of years saying, I can’t even find a doctor anymore because my doctor quit after COVID or it got too expensive because of insurance for a doctor to practice things like that. And, you know, I’m thinking, wow, I just make a phone call and go in and see somebody or they help me over the phone.

Sally
And to think that you have to wait sometimes months before you get in to see a doctor seems very counterproductive.

Kristen
Exactly. Yeah, 100.

Sally
Percent. That’s just.

Kristen
And those doctors are probably becoming DVC doctors if they can, because there’s a I mean, if you just Google deep, there’s a whole movement around it like Trump did some executive orders to make sure that we had the laws protecting it and we weren’t seen as an insurance industry. And so there’s been a lot of movement in Congress, even around the direct primary care.

Kristen
And it’s truly a win win. And like the doctor has better satisfaction and quality of life and the patients really, really appreciate it.

Sally
That’s great. So why is this model of primary care exploding across the country?

Kristen
I think just that like it’s probably more consumer driven than anything because we hear all the time, like people will say, Well, I have my insurance, but I have a $10,000 deductible that we never meet because we hate the medical system. We don’t want to go in and sit in the waiting room for over an hour to get in and have 5 to 8 minutes with our provider.

Kristen
Yeah, nothing’s ever really accomplished, except maybe I’ll get an antibiotic when I need a prescription. And we’re just finding that a lot of times it’s it’s cheaper to pay cash. So as we teach people that and I’ll give you an example, like if you need an x ray we’ve seen with insurance, X-rays can cost about $150 and we’ve negotiated cash pay rates of like $27 for an x ray.

Kristen
Wow. Yeah. With for MRI’s, we’ve heard people say 1500 to $3000 with insurance and our cash pay is 295. So that’s what I mean by we can do medicine significantly more like less cost. It’s way more cost effective, less expensive than using the insurance when we don’t really need the insurance.

Sally
Makes a lot of sense. So your family practice is called Keystone Natural Family practice. How does Keystone implement naturopathic medicine and direct primary care? Because this is really to me, it’s I should ask, you know, it’s just so smart. Okay.

Kristen
So most of the deep sea clinics in Arizona, as far as I know, are more traditional conventional medicine. And they’re great. I have nothing bad to say about them. I know a lot of the doctors who are doing that, but I think we’re really the only true naturopathic clinic that does that. So what we do is it’s a membership model and you just pay a pretty low monthly fee for your membership and then you have full access to the clinic.

Kristen
So you can come in every day if you need us, you can come in once a year however you want to. But in addition to your membership that covers like all of your visit, sick visits, well visits, you know, whatever you’d need on that front. But you also could get acupuncture and like for a member, it’s $25 or something to get vaccine.

Kristen
Sure you can do cupping. We have the IVs, nutrient IVs, we have a infrared sauna, you know, So all those additional services that we get to implement, plus we have a lot of people that say, you know, I’ve been on a blood pressure med for 20 years. I don’t even really know if I still need it. So we can safely take you off the blood pressure med, maybe start you on a botanical medicine to make sure your blood pressure stays down.

Kristen
Make sure you’re safe. So for people that either can’t take certain medications, don’t want to be on that many medications, there’s lots of options for them. So it again, is a nice bridge between the conventional and the natural empathic world. Like I have a guy who does international business and so he might call me and he’s like, I’m leaving for China in the morning and I have a sinus infection so I can easily get a mozzie pack.

Kristen
But after, you know, the third or fourth time of this, then we have the conversation. Let’s think about what you’re eating that may be causing these recurrent sinus infections. So we do more root cause medicine and really look at, again, the whole person, his lifestyle, how we can work with him to prevent the so that he doesn’t need a zip pack every you know.

Sally
Six every trip. Yeah.

Kristen
So it’s really fun like that and I think I love what I do because those people get healthy and like we just had a guy completely reverse diabetes with nomads. He’s lost £40. His Ainsley is back to normal. He’s off all of his pain meds because his back no longer hurts. You sleeping better? Like his whole quality of life is better.

Kristen
And he came in last week and he said, My son is starting to ask like, Dad, what are you doing? Like, I need to kind of figure this out. And people at work are saying, you know, what are you doing? So by doing that, it’s like, not only are we getting the patients healthy, but we’re getting their families healthy, which in turns get their workplace healthy, which, you know, we’re making healthy communities because they’re teaching each other, which is so, so awesome to me.

Sally
Very cool. So what can people expect to get when they go to Keystone?

Kristen
So my goal is just that personalized care. So when you come in, I want it to feel different. You know, you don’t wait in our waiting room. You might we, I don’t know, five, 6 minutes. But yeah, if that sometimes I’m waiting for the patient, you know, because we. So the time that you come in, you get a half hour with your doctor.

Kristen
It’s not sitting in the waiting.

Sally
Room 30 whole minutes, people. Yeah, that’s unheard of now.

Kristen
But there’s so much more that goes into health. Like sometimes we’ll be talking and they’re not doing well. And I, I get the luxury in that 30 minutes of saying what’s going on in your life and maybe their dog died or maybe their husband lost their job or you know, you have no idea. And that all impacts people’s mental, physical, spiritual health and so to truly get people better, we need to have that time in that relationship.

Kristen
And then we’re really big on on saying like, what are your goals? You know, if your goals are weight loss, then that’s going to be what we’re going to put first. But sometimes weight loss doesn’t happen because there’s environmental toxicities. Maybe you grow up in an area with, you know, on a golf course where you were getting pesticide and chemicals sprayed and that’s holding some of the weight on you.

Kristen
So we have to go down all those paths to kind of get to the true root of what’s going on with people. And so that’s what I love about it, is we really get to know our patients and can really make a difference.

Sally
You have a great team and it’s nice when you walk in and you see people that have been there for a long time. Yeah, you have. You do. You have a really great team and they just make you feel very comfortable.

Kristen
Thanks. Yeah. And we want that when you walk in, it’s not like insurance card and driver’s license, you know, as they slide the window over, it’s more like, Hey, Sally, how are you today?

Sally
Well, and that’s exactly it. Because I know going in, you know, they want you to fill out the same forms, not with you guys in general. You fill out the same types of forms. It’s like I was just here two weeks ago for something, and you’re asking me to fill the same paperwork out again? Okay, sure, I’ll do it.

Kristen
Yeah, exactly.

Sally
Yeah.

Kristen
So knowing and the team will know you and things like that.

Sally
Makes a huge difference. Okay, so how can people learn more about Keystone?

Kristen
Probably our website would be the best is WW w dot keystone medicine dot com and all the information on the membership is there and kind of what we do and how our providers are so.

Sally
And you are located I know you just opened another clinic we don’t need to necessarily talk about that one because it’s not invasive but your your best clinic is in Mesa.

Kristen
Yes the OG clinic in Mesa. Yes it is our largest clinic. I opened it 13 years ago after I graduated. Yes. And now we have two additional clinics as well to better serve the valley. Yeah. Because like I said, it’s consumer driven. And people I mean, I get calls start in North Dakota. We need you in Wyoming, you know, And I’m like, okay, guys, give me a minute.

Sally
So the Mesa Clinic is off of the second question.

Kristen
Christian and 60. Yeah, in the East Valley. Okay.

Sally
And you do have clinics in.

Kristen
Phoenix and Chandler.

Sally
Okay, Again, that’s fine. That’s great. Now, I’m really happy for you because it just shows that people are finally understanding what the value is and that there is a need out there. Absolutely. Yeah.

Kristen
Thank you for your all your support. You’ve been with me almost from day one, probably before day one, remember?

Sally
Well, yes, I think I knew you would score. Yeah, but yes, I do remember your grand opening. It was very fun. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Kristen
We had Matt Salmon.

Sally
Yes. Back in the day. Anyway. Well, next time you have an update, let us know so we can have you back and talk some more. Perfect. Thank you so much. Thank you. All right.

Kevin
This has been a Mesa Chamber of Commerce Inside Business podcast. You can find all podcast episodes at iTunes, Spotify, or your own favorite podcast Web site. You can also find them online at Mesa Chamber. Dot org. Content of this podcast is Copyright the Mesa Chamber of Commerce. Unless otherwise noted.

Learn more about Keystone Natural Family Medicine at: https://keystonemedicine.com/mesa-office/

The Mesa Chamber of Commerce Inside Business Podcast is a production of the Mesa Chamber of Commerce. Each episode is recorded in the University of Phoenix Podcast Studio. Inquiries regarding the MCIBP can be made via email to info@mesachamber.org.  The Podcast interviews members and individuals/organizations on topics of interest to Mesa Chamber members. Learn more at http://mesachamber.org

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