Alumnae’s passion for better access to care spawns new venture
Amid the stress and chaos of new marriages, babies and medical school, a friendship took root that empowered two FIU students to create a business that aims to provide better access to health care.
Florencia Goluboff ’13, M.D. ’20 and Michele Benjamin MBA, M.D. ’21 met while in medical school at the Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine. Their lives mirrored each other. Both were married and before graduation they both had kids. Soon the friends began planning the next stage of their careers together. They landed residencies at Baptist Health South Florida. And then they strategized ways to be able to raise their families while doing what they love.
While earning her Healthcare MBA at FIU, Benjamin–who was the first alumna to establish a scholarship for FIU medical students–learned about direct primary care, which gives family physicians an alternative to fee-for-service insurance billing, typically by charging patients a monthly, quarterly, or annual fee.
“Direct primary care improves access to health care and enables doctors to provide patients the attention and quality of care they deserve, all for a low monthly price,” says Benjamin, who lost her dad at a young age, and her mother raised her and her two siblings relying on government assistance. It was the kindness of a doctor who took her in when Medicaid would not cover her medical expenses that first drew her to medicine.
In 2023, Benjamin and Golubuff opened Awaken Health Direct Primary Care in Broward County. The physicians are able to limit the number of patients they see a day, offering each patient more time with them.
Correspondingly, Benjamin and Golubuff can balance their personal and professional lives better with a set number of patients and monthly revenue.
Golubuff, who was born in Argentina, also holds a bachelor’s in biomedical engineering from FIU. She says this is better access to care. “We can focus on preventive care. And that is what we loved about primary care to start.”