Resource center
Understand your healthcare options before you pay for them
Straight answers on membership medicine, virtual care, what things cost, and how to choose care for an aging parent. No sales language, no invented statistics.
Written and reviewed by Presence · Updated 2026
Virtual care & telehealth
What a virtual visit can and cannot do, when to use it instead of urgent care, and how a visit works start to finish.
What can telehealth actually help with?
A practical list of what a virtual visit handles well, what it handles partly, and what it cannot handle at all, written without overselling the format.
When should you use virtual care instead of going somewhere?
A straightforward decision guide for choosing between a virtual visit, an in-person appointment, urgent care and the emergency department, including red flags.
Should I use telehealth or go to urgent care?
Compare telehealth and urgent care on speed, cost, capability and follow-up, with a clear list of what urgent care can do that a virtual visit cannot.
How does an online medical visit actually work?
What happens before, during and after a virtual visit: what to prepare, what the provider can see, how prescriptions are handled and what follow-up looks like.
Can you use telehealth without insurance?
Telehealth is available without insurance through cash-pay visits or a membership. Compare the two routes, what each costs, and what to watch out for.
How much does telehealth cost?
What drives telehealth pricing, how per-visit fees compare with unlimited membership access, and the hidden add-ons to check before you pay.
Ready to act on this? 24/7 Virtual Care · Browse the virtual care & telehealth answer category
Primary care & direct primary care
What membership medicine is, how it differs from insurance-based and concierge care, and what it actually costs.
What is direct primary care?
Direct primary care is primary care paid for by a flat monthly membership instead of insurance billing. Here is what that changes, what it does not cover, and who it suits.
How does direct primary care work day to day?
From joining to your first visit, refills, labs and referrals: how a direct primary care membership works in practice, and what happens when you need care outside it.
How is direct primary care different from traditional insurance-based primary care?
A side-by-side comparison of membership-based direct primary care and insurance-billed primary care: access, visit length, cost, coverage and the trade-offs of each.
What is the difference between direct primary care and concierge medicine?
Concierge medicine and direct primary care both charge a membership fee. They differ in price, in whether insurance is still billed, and in who the model is built for.
Can you use direct primary care if you already have insurance?
Yes, and many members do. Here is how a direct primary care membership works alongside a health plan, what insurance still covers, and how HSA and FSA funds fit in.
How much does direct primary care cost?
What direct primary care memberships typically cost, what drives the price up or down, what is never included, and how Presence plans are priced from $19.99/month.
Can a nurse practitioner be your primary care provider in Texas?
What a nurse practitioner is, what an Adult-Gerontology Primary Care Nurse Practitioner does in Texas, how prescriptive authority works, and what to ask before choosing one.
Ready to act on this? Direct Primary Care · Browse the primary care & direct primary care answer category
Affordable & self-pay healthcare
Practical options for households without insurance, with a high deductible, or simply tired of unpredictable bills.
What are your healthcare options without insurance?
Practical routes to care when you have no coverage: cash-pay primary care, memberships, community clinics, cash-pay labs and prescription pricing, with the trade-offs of each.
How can a family with a high deductible afford routine care?
If your deductible means routine care is effectively self-pay, here is how to lower the cost of everyday visits, labs and prescriptions without dropping coverage.
How can I reduce what I spend on routine healthcare?
Concrete tactics for lowering routine healthcare spending: asking for cash prices, choosing where labs are drawn, generics, avoiding avoidable facility fees, and fixing access.
Is a primary care membership better than paying per visit?
Run the comparison properly: when per-visit pricing wins, when a membership wins, and the behavioral cost of pricing every symptom individually.
What is self-pay primary care?
Self-pay primary care means you pay the practice directly at a published price. How it differs from billing insurance, where it saves money, and where it does not.
Ready to act on this? Membership Pricing · Browse the affordable & self-pay healthcare answer category
Family & pediatric virtual care
How household virtual care works, what a child's virtual visit can cover, and where the age boundaries sit.
How does telehealth work for a whole family?
What household virtual care looks like in practice: who is covered, how a visit is requested for a child or a parent, what happens in the visit, and where it stops.
Can children use telehealth?
Children can be cared for virtually for many everyday concerns, with real limits. What a pediatric virtual visit covers, how consent works, and when a child must be seen in person.
Ready to act on this? Family Virtual Health · Browse the family & pediatric virtual care answer category
Prescriptions & refills
How a refill evaluation works virtually, what may be prescribed, and what will never be prescribed online.
Ready to act on this? Refill Visits · Browse the prescriptions & refills answer category
Labs, imaging & testing
How testing is ordered from a virtual visit, where you go for the draw or scan, and how results are reviewed.
How do labs and imaging work with virtual care?
A virtual provider cannot draw blood or run a scan, but can order both. The practical sequence: what gets ordered, where you go, who bills you, and how results are reviewed.
What blood tests does primary care usually order, and why?
The handful of blood tests that make up most primary-care laboratory work — what each one measures, the question it answers, when it is ordered, and why a panel is chosen rather than everything at once.
What do a CBC and a CMP actually show?
A plain-English guide to the two most commonly ordered panels: what the blood count and metabolic panel components represent, what patterns tend to prompt, and why one value out of range is rarely the whole story.
What do A1c and cholesterol results actually mean?
What a hemoglobin A1c and a lipid panel measure, why cholesterol decisions depend on overall risk rather than one number, what moves each result, and how monitoring intervals are chosen.
What does a TSH test show, and when is thyroid testing worthwhile?
Why TSH is the usual first thyroid test, what a high or low result points towards, which follow-on tests are added, what makes a result unreliable, and why one abnormal TSH is not a diagnosis.
Do I need to fast for blood work?
Which common tests require fasting and which do not, what fasting actually means, what to do about water, coffee and medications, and what happens if you ate by mistake.
How often should you get routine blood work?
Why there is no universal interval for blood work, what actually sets the frequency, when more frequent testing is genuinely useful, and why more testing is not the same as better care.
What happens after an abnormal lab result?
The four things a provider can do with an abnormal result, why repeating is so often the right move, which results need attention the same day, and how to get a result explained rather than left on a portal.
Ready to act on this? Labs & Imaging Savings · Browse the labs, imaging & testing answer category
DFW local care
What care costs locally without insurance, how to be seen without coverage, and where local in-office visits happen.
How much does a doctor visit cost without insurance in Fort Worth?
What actually drives the price of a self-pay visit in Fort Worth and DFW, the questions to ask before you agree to be seen, and the prices Presence publishes.
Can I see a provider without insurance in DFW?
Yes. Here are the realistic ways to be seen in Dallas–Fort Worth without coverage, what each option is good at, and how Presence self-pay and membership care works.
What are affordable family healthcare options in DFW?
How DFW families keep routine healthcare predictable: what household virtual membership covers, where in-person care fits, and what none of it replaces.
Ready to act on this? Dallas–Fort Worth Care · Browse the dfw local care answer category
Self-employed, 1099 & gig workers
Healthcare options when nobody provides a benefit for you, and how membership care fits alongside coverage.
Ready to act on this? Self-Employed Healthcare · Browse the self-employed, 1099 & gig workers answer category
Older adults & caregivers
Choosing primary care for yourself or an aging parent, why continuity matters, and how medication review works.
What is adult-gerontology primary care?
Adult-gerontology primary care focuses on adults through later life: multiple conditions, medication burden, function and independence. Here is what that focus changes.
How do I choose primary care for an aging parent?
A practical checklist for adult children: what to ask a practice, how to judge access and continuity, and how to handle distance, transport and medication complexity.
Why does continuity of care matter for older adults?
Seeing the same provider over time changes what gets noticed, what gets prescribed and what gets missed. Why continuity carries more weight in later life.
How does a medication review work for older adults?
What a structured medication review covers, why lists grow over time, how to prepare for one, and what questions to ask about each prescription.
How often should an older adult see a primary care provider?
How visit frequency is actually decided for older adults, what a good visit covers, the changes that should prompt a sooner appointment, and the warning signs that mean urgent care instead.
Does telehealth work well for older adults?
An honest account of virtual care in later life: the visits it handles well, the assessments that need hands-on examination, how to make a video visit easy, and how family can take part.
What does preventive care look like after 65?
What prevention means in later life: the categories that get reviewed, why recommendations are individual rather than a checklist, how monitoring is ordered locally, and what needs an in-person visit.
What is polypharmacy, and how is it managed?
Why taking several medications carries its own risk, how a structured review works, what gets asked about each medicine, and the warning signs that a medication is causing harm.
How can I help an aging parent manage their healthcare and medications?
A practical guide for the adult child coordinating care: building an accurate medication list, preparing for visits, tracking results, joining virtual visits, and knowing which changes need urgent attention.
How are falls prevented, and when is dizziness an emergency?
What actually reduces fall risk, why a fall deserves a work-up rather than reassurance, how medications contribute, and the dizziness patterns that mean emergency care right now.
How are blood pressure and diabetes managed in older adults?
Why targets are individualised in later life, how home readings drive decisions, what monitoring is usually involved, and the readings and symptoms that need urgent attention.
For an older adult, when is it primary care, urgent care or the emergency room?
How to choose the right setting for an older adult: what each one can genuinely do, why the threshold for emergency care is lower in later life, and the symptoms that should never wait.
Ready to act on this? Older Adult Primary Care · Browse the older adults & caregivers answer category
Employers & small business
How small employers add real primary-care access without buying a second insurance plan.
What healthcare options does a small business actually have?
Group insurance, ICHRA, stipends and primary care memberships each solve a different problem. Here is what each one does, what it costs a small employer, and where they combine.
How can we offer employees healthcare without buying group insurance?
If a group plan is out of budget, you still have real options. How primary care memberships, virtual access and stipends work — and what to tell employees honestly.
Does better primary care access reduce employee absence?
Why appointment friction, not illness, drives much of avoidable absence — and how same-day virtual access and continuity change the pattern for a small team.
How do we actually roll out a primary care benefit?
A step-by-step rollout for a small employer adding a primary care membership: choosing the tier, enrolling households, announcing it clearly, and driving real usage.
Ready to act on this? Employer Plans · Browse the employers & small business answer category
Symptoms & conditions
What a virtual visit can realistically assess for everyday problems — and the findings that need hands-on care instead.
Can an online provider treat a UTI?
How a virtual visit assesses urinary symptoms, when testing is needed before treatment, the warning signs that need in-person or emergency care, and why no visit guarantees an antibiotic.
Can telehealth treat a sinus infection?
How a virtual visit assesses sinus symptoms, why most sinus infections are viral, when an antibiotic is and is not appropriate, and the warning signs that need urgent in-person care.
Can telehealth treat pink eye?
What a virtual visit can assess for a red, irritated eye, which causes need in-person eye examination, the red flags that make it urgent, and why treatment is not automatic.
Can telehealth treat a rash?
How a virtual visit assesses a rash, what photographs and video can and cannot show, the rash patterns that are emergencies, and when dermatology or in-person care is needed.
Can telehealth treat allergies?
How virtual care manages seasonal and environmental allergy symptoms, when testing or specialist referral makes sense, and why severe allergic reactions are never a virtual matter.
Can telehealth treat high blood pressure?
How virtual primary care manages high blood pressure with home readings and lab monitoring, what readings need urgent attention, and where an in-person visit is required.
Ready to act on this? Get Care Now · Browse the symptoms & conditions answer category
Medications & prescribing
What may be prescribed after a virtual assessment, what needs monitoring first, and what is never prescribed online here.
Can telehealth prescribe antibiotics?
When a virtual visit can result in an antibiotic, why most respiratory infections do not need one, what testing may be required first, and the categories never prescribed virtually.
Can I get blood pressure medication online?
How a virtual visit handles starting, continuing and adjusting blood pressure medication, the home readings and lab monitoring involved, and when in-person assessment is required.
Ready to act on this? Refill Visits · Browse the medications & prescribing answer category
Healthcare costs & price transparency
What Presence care costs, how membership maths actually works, and how to ask any practice for a price before you agree to it.
How much does telehealth cost without insurance?
What a virtual visit costs at Presence without insurance, how household membership changes the maths, what is and is not included, and how to check any other service's real price.
Is telehealth cheaper than urgent care?
How to compare the cost of a virtual visit with urgent care without relying on made-up averages, what drives the difference, and when urgent care is the right spend anyway.
Ready to act on this? Membership Pricing · Browse the healthcare costs & price transparency answer category
Urgent vs primary vs virtual care
Which setting fits which problem, what each one can do, and how to avoid paying for the wrong kind of visit.
What conditions can telehealth treat?
A practical guide to what a virtual visit handles well, what it can start but not finish, and what it cannot do at all — with the emergency exceptions stated plainly.
What cannot be treated through telehealth?
The limits of virtual care: emergencies, problems needing physical examination or imaging, procedures, controlled substances, and situations where in-person assessment is the only safe answer.
When should I use telehealth instead of urgent care?
A decision guide for choosing between a virtual visit, urgent care, primary care and the emergency department — based on what each setting can actually do.
Ready to act on this? Start Here · Browse the urgent vs primary vs virtual care answer category
Preventive care & ongoing management
How prevention and long-term condition management work when your primary care is virtual-first.
Ready to act on this? Preventive Care · Browse the preventive care & ongoing management answer category
Women's health
Preventive care, screening, menopause, recurrent urinary infections and the tests that come up most — inside verified scope.
What preventive care and screening do women need at each age?
The categories of screening and preventive care women are usually offered through adulthood, why the timing is individual, where national recommendations live, and what a virtual-first practice can arrange.
What happens in perimenopause and menopause, and when should I see a provider?
What the transition involves, why testing is often unhelpful, which symptoms deserve evaluation, what a primary-care visit can cover, and the bleeding patterns that need prompt assessment.
Why do I keep getting UTIs, and what should be done about it?
What counts as recurrent, why repeat episodes deserve a culture rather than another guess, what a work-up looks at, the prevention measures with a real basis, and the symptoms that mean urgent care.
Which blood tests matter most for women, and when?
Why these three come up so often in women's health, what each test measures, when screening is usually considered, how results are acted on, and what a single abnormal value does and does not mean.
Which women's health concerns can be handled virtually, and which need an office visit?
A practical division of women's primary-care concerns into what a virtual visit handles well, what needs an in-person examination, what needs a specialist, and what needs urgent care today.
Ready to act on this? Adult Primary Care · Browse the women's health answer category
Men's health
Preventive care, the three numbers that matter most, and the concerns men most often leave unsaid.
What preventive care and screening do men need, and when?
The preventive-care areas men are usually offered through adulthood, why timing depends on risk rather than age alone, where the national recommendations live, and what a virtual-first practice can arrange.
How are blood pressure, cholesterol and blood sugar managed in men?
How the three most common men's primary-care numbers are assessed and managed, what home readings add, which laboratory tests are used, what changes them, and the symptoms that mean emergency care.
What do men most often delay raising with a provider?
The primary-care concerns men most often sit on: fatigue, sleep, mood, weight, alcohol, sexual health and pain — what a visit actually does with each, and which symptoms should not wait at all.
Which men's health concerns can be handled virtually, and which need an office visit?
A practical division of men's primary-care concerns into what a virtual visit handles well, what needs an in-person examination, what needs a specialist, and what needs emergency care today.
Ready to act on this? Adult Primary Care · Browse the men's health answer category
Still deciding? Talk to a person.
We will tell you honestly whether a Presence membership fits your situation — including when it does not.