After nearly a decade as a DC-area hospitalist, Dr. Nadia Sirdar opted out of Medicare to properly care for elderly patients aging in place, and built a Direct Primary Care practice where half her patients turned out to be husbands wanting the same care as their wives.

When corporate ownership bought the Direct Primary Care practice Dr. Josh Chow spent five years building, he did not take a new job. He and his wife spent just over $100,000 in donated equipment, loans, and grit to open Ohana Medical instead.

When their clinic closed overnight after federal legislation defunded its parent organization, three physicians lost 13,000 patients in weeks. Half of their $50,000 startup budget for Open Arms Primary Care came from strangers on GoFundMe.