It was the kind of pace that leads to burnout for many doctors.

But Gold did something most of his colleagues have not: He ditched a job at a Partners HealthCare physicians group and launched his own practice, using an uncommon but emerging business model known as direct Primary Care.

Gold has stopped accepting health Insurance. He charges a flat monthly fee for up to a dozen visits a year and is easily reached by e-mail and cellphone. He has far fewer patients now, but he can spend more time with each one.

“It’s really blue-collar concierge medicine,” Gold said.

It’s also a refreshing change from the old system of being mired in insurance codes and claims. That “was all about volume and coding and how many people a day you can see,” Gold said.

“I couldn’t do it anymore. It was not aligned with how I grew up thinking about medicine.”

Direct Primary care is an offshoot of so-called concierge medicine, which has been growing steadily since the 1990s. But concierge doctors usually bill insurers, in addition to charging monthly fees. Typically, their patients pay at least $100 a month, and sometimes several hundred or even thousands of dollars monthly.

Direct primary care practices take the drastic step of bypassing insurance — thus the term “direct.” Patients pay fees, often less than $100 a month, but they avoid copayments and co-insurance for primary care.

Patients who choose to see direct primary care doctors still must buy Health Insurance — to cover the costs of any serious illness and to comply with the federal Affordable Care Act. That makes the option too costly for many people.

But advocates of the direct model say patients should pay separate fees for primary care while saving the insurance for emergencies and big expenses. They liken it to how consumers use car insurance: Pay out-of-pocket for an oil change, but tap the insurance after a fender-bender.

Read the entire Boston Globe article here.