We joined his practice when a switch in our insurance required we find a new primary care doc. We were actually glad to find an excuse to boot our crappy PCP who was both incompetent and too lazy to work the insurance maze when doing so required the assistance of a doctor, despite the fact that she was a strong liberal. Our insurance broker said many of his clients liked this guy. I didn't ask, and he didn't share (if he knew), information about his politics.
At our first visit (as I always do with a new provider), I made him aware of our family situation (lesbian couple with a daughter conceived by donor insemination) and told him if caring for us would be an issue we would find another doctor. He said it wouldn't be a problem.
He has always treated us respectfully, always asked each of us about the other, and about our daughter; always treated my spouse as our daughter's mother - even though the state of Ohio insists she isn't. He is the fiercest PCP advocate I have ever had against the insurance company. He has never failed to get approval for any out of the ordinary medical request (and our family has lots). He recognizes our different abilities to handle medical information (I'm the medical researcher, my spouse thinks storks bring babies (not quite, but you get the picture), and our daughter is somewhere in between), and he speaks to each of us at the level we need. Because medical conditions impact both my spouse's and my daughter's mental abilities, we occasionally have some tricky interpersonal dynamics. He has never betrayed information about my spouse and daughter I have felt necessary to share with them - and has used the information I have relayed to better care for them. He's not the brightest bulb on the planet - but I don't need him to be. I need him to be competent enough to know his limits and to find the right resources when our care is beyond his limits, and he does.
Now that we know his politics, we exchange friendly political banter nearly every time we visit. Who knows - maybe we'll change his mind someday. It can't hurt to hear different opinions from people he respects (and he does respect us). But whether we change his mind on the big picture - I am sure knowing our family intimately is good for what ails him. So I'm not planning on changing any time soon.
I'm not bashing your choice at all - it is a good one, and I often do choose to spend my money on people who share my social and political opinions. Just sharing a different perspective since I already happened to be thinking about it for other reasons today (a friend of mine is polling his LGBT friends about health care).
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