New diagnostic center to focus on prevention. (Health Care Services: Advertising Supplement).

Designed with the concept in mind that "the patient is the priority," and to meet the local need for a "Center of Excellence" in the spirit of the Mayo Clinic, the new Robertson Diagnostic Associates will open its doors to patients for the first time this June in Beverly Hills.

Currently under construction at Beverly Hills Medical Plaza on Robertson Boulevard just north of Wilshire, Robertson Diagnostic Associates will service the entire Los Angeles area. Specialists available in the building will include cardiology, neurology, immunology, radiologist, and infectious disease experts, as well as gastroenterology.

A primary focus is on preventative and preemptive healthcare to ensure the highest quality of life possible. One physician will oversee a patient's healthcare from start to finish. This ensures that one physician is responsible for the journey through diagnostic systems and will report findings to patients personally.

Initially founded by Robert Koblin M.D. and Robert Huizenga M.D., their goal was to improve on the current level of excellence and patient convenience in the medical care system. With extensive experience in private medicine and the shortcomings of the current health care system in the United States, the two physicians saw the need for a better system in Los Angeles.

The driving concept behind the Associates is that at any good diagnostic center, patients should be the priority -- which means highly personalized care in a convenient, comfortable extended private office environment. Individualized attention guarantees each patient the complete healthcare he deserves.

The Associates will offer full-scale preventative healthcare screening including the latest advanced nuclear imaging which scans arteries for cholesterol build-up, stress testing, bone density, body fat monitors, colonoscopy, all standard cardiology protocols and a full battery of laboratory tests under one roof.

Medicine of the Future

Disturbed by the economic and bureaucratic demands of insurance companies, health maintenance organizations, & strangulative limitations of Medicare, Dr. Huizenga decided there must be a better way to practice medicine wherein "patients would be the priority," and the focus could be on prevention. A specialist in internal medicine trained at Harvard Medical School and Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, formerly the team physician for the Los Angeles Raiders and currently a Professor of Clinical Medicine at UCLA in addition to his active private practice, Dr. Huizenga has organized several new physicians to join Robertson Diagnostic Associates for this new experiment in excellence.

Dr. Koblin, a graduate of NYU, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and Stanford University currently practices Internal Medicine and Cardiology in Beverly Hills and is also currently an Assistant Clinical Professor of Medicine at UCLA.

"We can offer this level care at a competitive price by eliminating the costly middle man, focusing on prevention rather than trying to treat disease that was discovered too late," said Dr. Koblin. "As most medical costs are actually spent in damage control, good medical care is far more efficient and less costly. We're focusing on early diagnoses, intervention, and treatment. This is the medicine of the future."

Rather than focusing on disease which has already become manifest, the new Diagnostic Center's goal is to be preemptive rather than reactionary," continued Dr. Koblin. "Damage control is far more expensive than good medical care. The belief is that with decisions being made by a patient's physician, outcomes will maximally benefit that patient, as opposed to having the decisions made by the insurance company or local board of an HMO. In that manner, care and attention should be enhanced."

Healthcare in the U.S. is excellent, but it has suffered from the draconian bureaucratic demands placed on it by the government and insurance companies. This has caused economic misdirection of resources so that both the patient and physician have become, in effect, hostages to a bureaucratic nightmare designed by insurance companies for their own profit.

They limited dollars actually spent on patients and the constant denying of physicians their correct reimbursements, the current system has resulted in a tremendous loss of excellence for all involved except for the insurance companies. American medicine has been searching for the right balance between cost and quality for mainstream America. But what has happened is that physicians and patients have lost their connection, profits end up in the pockets of executives rather the hospitals and physicians, and the private patient receives mediocre medical care at best.

Robertson Diagnostics Associates was developed to tackle these issues directly and provide appropriate care and service to those people who wish to invest in themselves and in their own health to guarantee themselves the best quality of life possible throughout their lives. As we live longer and longer this becomes more vital and important. In fact, the earlier we can focus on preventive medicine the better should be our quality of life.

Tracey Darroll, M.A., is CEO of Iris Capitol Group and a Managing Partner of Beverly Hills Medical Plaza.