Bridge Family Health Connects

You’re on a first name basis at Bridge Family Health with Dr. Jeff and Dr. Emma. That’s how well they want to know their patients, and vice versa.  “It’s all about the relationships we build,” says Dr. Emma – who we know as Emma Daisy, MD who served as IAFP president in 2023-2024. 

On June 24, Bridge Family Health cut the ribbon on their direct primary care practice in Skokie surrounded by family, friends, patients and city officials including Skokie Mayor Ann Tennes.

Bridge Family Health connects two family physicians who met during Dr. Daisy’s residency at Northwestern McGaw Family Medicine Residency at Erie Family Health Center in the Humboldt Park community of Chicago and later worked together at Tapestry 360 (then Heartland Health) an FQHC on the north side of Chicago.

Dr. Jeff is Jeff Panzer, MD who has been practicing in Chicago since 2010 after his family medicine residency at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia. Dr. Jeff previously served as the vice president of care transformation for Tapestry 360 Health and as the physician innovator at AllianceChicago.

“Dr. Emma” completed her family medicine residency at Northwestern/Erie Family Health in 2014, and completed a fellowship in geriatrics at the University of Chicago in 2015, and has been practicing in the Chicago area since then. She is passionate about health equity and primary care access, and she remains active in both the Illinois and American Academies of Family Physicians.

Bridge Family Health (www.bridgefamilyhealth.com) provides preventive health, disease management, urgent care and some procedures. The practice offers individual membership for adults and children of all ages, a family membership and an option for two-adult households to meet the community needs. They also offer options for small businesses to provide health care for employees.

“We wanted to create a practice built around relationships and human connection,” says Panzer. “We want to help them stay healthy, and when life throws challenges their way, we want to help them navigate those challenges too.”

As an Evanston resident with two young children, Daisy was searching for a place that would support more meaningful relationships, both in practice and in her personal life.  “At Bridge, I can provide not just patient encounters, but also care for people.  People who live and work in my community.  The community that takes care of me and my family, every day.”

“Emma was brave enough to join me on this adventure. We have known each other for many years. We share backgrounds in community health, spent time working in Ethiopia, and both believe deeply in whole-person, relationship-based care. It's been a privilege building this practice together,” concludes Panzer.

Another IAFP past president, Ellen Brull, MD was present for the ribbon cutting, having now retired from her private practice in Niles which she built with her residency friend Dr. Deborah Geismar.  Dr. Emma sees a lot of what Bridge will be from what she saw in them.  “Basically we want to build the same long-term relationships that Ellen and Deb had with their patients here in Evanston and Skokie.” She and Jeff are excited for the opportunity the DPC model offers to make this happen.

Learn more about Direct Primary Care.
IAFP Direct Primary Care Member Interest Group
AAFP DPC Information