Episode 90: Dr. Katrice Brooks of Quench Clinic - Wauwatosa, WI
- Maryal Concepcion
- Jul 17, 2022
- 49 min read
Updated: Jul 31, 2022
Direct Primary Care Doctor
Dr. Katrice Brooks is double board-certified in Family and Lifestyle Medicine. Dr. Brooks has over 10 years of experience in primary care. She helps patients get the care they deserve with a doctor who listens, spends time with them, answers their questions and she also helps her patients achieve their goals. She is passionate about health equality, improving lives by reducing medications where she can, and being a champion for patient and physician autonomy. She has spoken nationally at events like the 2022 Hint Summit focusing on health care through the Direct Primary Care model and practicing authentically.
She opened Quench Clinic in 2021.
Dr. Brooks Speaking About Quench Clinic
Dr. Brooks As Featured On The Milwaukee Business News BizTimes
Dr. Brook's YouTube Channel
Dr. Katrice Brooks As Featured On:
LINKS/RECOMMENDED RESOURCES: VIDEOS, PODCASTS FEATURING DOCTOR
- Taylor & Kelly's Dermatology HERE
- Botox for Asians HERE
- Cafer's Psychopharmacology: HERE
- Fiverr
- EntreMD Business School
- Dr. Caroline Robinson's Instagram
- Dr. Corey Hartman's Instagram
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DPC means creating a private practice that honors the humanity of both doctor and patient. I explain DPC to people as a framework to build a type of clinic that works best for me as a person, while still bringing great value to patients. I'm Dr. Katrice Brooks of Quench Clinic and this is my DPC story.
Welcome to the podcast Dr. Brooks.
Thank you so much. I'm so excited to be here. This is literally a dream for me. It even feels surreal doing it and watching you here. So happy to be here and to share.
It's definitely a mutual excitement. You and I opened around the same time, you in October and me in September of 2021. It's like that homecoming feel talking with you today.
Absolutely. You were my first conception of what DPC was. So it is surreal.
Awesome.
Can you tell us a little bit about your history growing up and how you ended up being the doctor today that you are practicing authentically with your patients?
DPC helps you find who you are to practice authentically. Like we, We come to it because of feeling constrained in some way. My story and what led me to creating a DPC and wanting to serve my patients in ways that I felt restricted was I grew up with a mom who struggled with drugs.
In fact, my dad also struggled with drugs when I was a young child, but he,
um, became sober and he was able to raise me. My mom struggled with drugs my entire life. We reconciled our relationship and after becoming a doctor, she actually lived with me until she passed. That kind of formed who I was growing up.
I always really wanted to figure my mom out when I was a kid. I wanted to be a psychiatrist because I knew my mom had like internal struggles and, I was just trying to make sense of it. Then, in high school I thought I maybe wanted to go to art school
or, you know, I, I have this desire to create as well.
I went to med school and loved all the things. So I went to family medicine. I loved the relationship with people. I wanted to do all the things, especially women's health and also pediatrics.
That's how most of us in different family, But, Knowing my mom, how that influenced me and my sister, it taught me early that everyone has a story. It taught me early that I wanted to treat everyone with grace and that I wanted to give everybody the space that they needed.
In my life, I always felt invisible and I wanted to make people feel seen. And In the same way that I feel like my mom was this invisible person in society. I always wanted to see that person when they came to me in my office and give them the time that they needed. When people came to me, I wanted to fix all the things.
We don't have time to fix all the things in corporate medicine. I bumped up against that two years in, really early on, not having the time and wanting to really connect with people. I love connecting with people. That is the reason that I do what I do.
That's amazing. I am so honored and humbled every time I hear a person's background story because where we came from is all different. Everybody is a unique individual. You sharing that really ties in with a quote that I wanna pull from your interview with the Milwaukee Business News BizTimes.
You were quoted as saying the, the math wasn't adding up. You had over 2,500 patients and on any given day you were squeezing in appointments with about 25 of them.
You remarked how busy and behind you were. When you talk about your mom and her being a quote on quote invisible person and making sure that your patients did not feel that invisibility, I wanna ask about how you went from that environment to learning about DPC and then deciding that you were going to open up quench clinic.
It was really during the pandemic that it was like, you know what, this does not work. There were times in corporate medicine where I was able to make a lot of money where I was able to work and squirrel and, do urgent care and make all the money, but I was miserable.
During the pandemic, We were seeing less patients in office, but I felt like my work went up actually, my emails went up, calls, phone, all the non-reimbursed non RVU amount of work went up, especially for these 2,500 patients that could not get in my wait time, went up to two, three months.
I could feel demand.
Cause Every time they saw me, there was like, I can't get in to see you. I'm getting pressured by administration to see more patients but the paychecks at that point actually stop adding up because one, they cut our pay during the pandemic, because I didn't see all the patients that I should have seen, the year of 2020, when it first hit, I had to pay them back. I didn't make my RVs and I had to pay them back. That was my come to Jesus moment before it was like, you know what, I hate not being able to connect with patients.
I got certified in lifestyle medicine because it was like, there has to be something more And
then I try to bring it back to my administration and they won't let me do Saturday visits.
They won't let me do group visits. They won't let me do these tools that I think that I have, that will help my patients. But that's okay. I'm still doing the coaching in the 15 minute visits that we have with the patients that makes them, an hour and take from another patient. That's what we do in corporate medicine.
We take and give. So I'm trying to do all the things, but I'm still feeling unfulfilled. But I'm loving my patients. I just see a lot of them, so much so that at times it feels unsafe, I feel like I'm drowning, I'm saying to administration, I need a scribe.
And they're just like, you don't make enough to get scribed. The other doctors in my office had scribes, so I guess they saw more patients every six months. I'd be like can you look at my numbers again? Can I get it? Can I get the extra inmates that they have?
It felt unfair because, there were different resources, which is fine, but here I am feeling like I'm drowning. I dread coming to work every day because I'm behind in all my charts. I'm asking for help and I'm not getting it. So I was going to leave medicine, you know what, they're ING my pay the weeks that they started taking the $20,000 out of a short time period, the end of that week, I put in my six month notice.
At that point I had found your podcast and I had found Dr. Una's podcast. You two are like, the jet fuel and the lighter. The two of them together was like, you know what? That's not for me, even if I go to the competitor, it's the same corporate medicine is the same.
Even if they slowly ramp me up. The end expectation is that I'm going to be responsible for all of these patients and lives and labs at the expense of myself. This for myself is not working. This is not the vision that I had of myself, of my life.
When my mom was in hospice, that made me realize that the reason I was working was for family. I'm working to live my life. I'm working to be there for family. So I never felt good. Like even in my off time I should be charting. I should be responding and doing this. And I just didn't like it, it was a terrible work life balance and I was going to leave medicine, but I heard your podcast and I figured,
I can do medicine the way I wanna do medicine. I don't have to not see patients anymore, I can still do that and be happy. It seemed like Kool-Aid it didn't seem real. It didn't seem like get this and have this and do this and dabble in all my interests.
I found your podcast and I put in my notice very soon after I binged on both your podcasts, I put in my notice and I just started doing it messy. I had to give a six month notice. And so it was like, you know what. I wanna kinda do it around my birthday. I put in the notice and just started doing it messy until I got there.
When is your birthday? Cuz you
opened October 10th. It's October 3rd.
I love that. What a way to celebrate your life, you took the reins to your own life and made a pathway for yourself to never have to make yourself or other patients feel invisible again.
So congratulations to
you. Thank you. That's exactly it. I'm still okay. Feeling invisible. I still like to hide and Dr. Una is showing me not to hide. Her business coaching is do the opposite of that. Your patients need you and they need to find you. And that's how they're gonna find you is you not hiding, but it's really to make my patients feel seen.
I know that's why they all come to me. They feel seen
I love that. When we talk about relationship based care, that is really getting at the heart of it. Especially when you're doing things like lifestyle medicine, holistic based care, it takes time.
With that said, I wanna now jump into when you turned in your six month notice when you decided I'm going to do DPC or not be in medicine anymore. One of the things that you did early on was you had, and this is not something that easy to do during the pandemic, but you were able to visit Dr.
Amanda Berger at roots MD in Verona, Wisconsin, before you opened. And I wanna delve in there because now that people are doing, more face to face things, we have live in person conferences. I wanna ask what was that like as this person who was like, I'm gonna do DPC and here's a real life breathing DPC that I'm actually inside of and visiting and talking with the doctor who runs it.
I remember when I saw my first DP in person, it was Dr. Janine roams practice, Santa Cruz DBC. It was another layer of this is legit real. So I wanna ask what was your experience with Dr. Berger and how did that impact you? What did you draw from that to build on in your own
clinic?
I just started talking to anybody who would talk . She was so gracious. She talked to me on the phone that I went to visit her. She'll talk to me now. It was amazing.
Everybody in DPC is really so gracious. I haven't met anyone in this, field or this group that's not gracious, but seeing it in practice. So I saw both of her clinic locations. Seeing how she interacted and how her day today went in her small clinic was super inspirational because it was so efficient. It was one room, one office, everything was, this, 12 by 12 space. That was amazing and inspirational.
Cause it was like, I don't need much to do this. I can go an office space and I can hit the ground run. I can start this with what I have. It is tangible, then when I saw the clinic that she's building OMG,
The clinic itself is gorgeous. It's in the style that I love, it's multiple exam rooms and really made me just think even bigger about DPC. I thought of DPC as initially my little solo thing I'm gonna have my people and, I don't know how big I wanted to be, but I wanted to be manageable because I felt overwhelmed before.
I was seeing too many people and I felt I was giving too much. Seeing Amanda's clinic, it's so beautiful. It inspired me to dream even bigger even if I have to get like a loan or something. If I want a big gorgeous clinic, I can have gorgeous clinic and hire people to work in the clinic
it just really opened my mind. And in a way that's different than the podcast. The podcast is also amazing, cuz it also opens your mind to types of clinics. I wouldn't even conceive of right here's this type and this type of person and how they make it work for them and seeing it in person for a person who had children and who lived in Wisconsin, who deal dealt with the same payers that I dealt with.
I ended up doing a locums job after shadowing her with the corporation that she worked for, which I think it was, or it was a competitor, but they knew her, which was also amazing to see her around the world professionally to see her colleagues and what they thought and how she, who she was in corporate medicine in that, she is thriving, doing DPC.
Like she, she is totally making it work. Like I'm making it work with locums. Like I'm halfway doing it, but she's doing it for real all the time. And it was really inspirational.
When you talk about that, seeing and talking with her, live time really made you dream bigger. I love that because, when we become business owners under the model of DPC it's very new to most of us who don't have an MBA.
And even if we do have an MBA, like it's our, it's potentially our first business that we've opened. And so when you talk about dreaming big, I wanna ask about, what were some of those dreams that you started incorporating in your, in your future goals?
So I would, I'm sometimes I'm even afraid to talk about it.
Cause I feel like it's such a big dream, but it's really what I want. I think it incorporates all of the parts of me in a clinic, which is really what we're looking to do. So the dream for quench, so now it's quench clinic, but the dream is quench clinic fitness and spa. That's a lot I've thought about changing that to quench med gym and spa, like three word I'm figuring it out, three words. But it's, I would love to have a large space where I serve patients as their physician or their health consult. But also where there's gym space and where we do physical therapy and we do group coaching or group fitness classes, including yoga. And also, cause I'm interested in aesthetics medicine, like Julie Sparks, who, now in my clinic now I do pills and, neurotoxins like Botox, but also having actual spa space because I'm all about like full wellness.
, Mm-hmm , you know, just. Health and healing and all the different modalities of healing, sound, bath healing and just all of it, water float therapy. So that is the big dream. And because I'm also in Dr. Una's class, I don't, maybe this can be more than one place. I don't know.
I'm, like I'm dreaming sometimes I'm afraid of my dreams, but I'm gonna go after it. I'm just keep going. I wanna see where I end up.
I love that. And one of the things that, we're gonna, we're gonna talk about later is the fact that you have this series of videos and that you call the be better show.
And it's just right in alignment with that, because you are constantly, working towards that dream every day. You are at quench clinic and every day that you are, your own boss. So I wanna ask there, when you picked the name quench clinic, can you tell us about, the thoughts going on in your head and how did you come to decide on quench clinic, as a name for your
practice.
Perfect. So I wanna talk about this. I have another story is that relates to this I met. So I'm gonna do the story, but then I'll talk about the name sounds good. And Rebecca barons is in my EV she's ans classmate. And so we finally met in person at our, we had a EVs mastermind or business mastermind meeting.
And so we're talking and I look at her jacket and it says Vita medicine. And I say, Hey, I know you, how was your on my DPC story? And I remember your name, Vita medicine. And I really like your name, Vita medicine. I like how you chosen and how, it brings life. So I love this segment of your show.
It really personalizes these clinic or these clinics so that we get to know the heart of who the creator is. And it's part of the story. And it's one of the best things about DPC. We get to pick our clinic names and nobody tells us what it is. So that's, I love this. This is the most memorable moment of the show for me, or I didn't even realize that's what I keep from the shows, but literally it was just like, Hey, I.
That this is like Rebecca Baron's, Vita clinic. Love it. So yeah, so I love that you do this. So my clinic quench clinic is I it's to quench a thirst or a need. I grew up, in the ghetto I grew up in poverty and there were food deserts. I grew up in a food desert.
Like when I learned about that, I'm like, oh, the neighborhood, you know, where there's no grocery stores, this is normal. But there were also health deserts there weren't hospitals and clinics. And so where I practiced at, in Milwaukee, it wasn't a health desert where I was on the, in the suburbs in Milwaukee where I was initially practicing and where I've moved to in Wawa.
I wouldn't say there's a ton of family practice clinics. There's certainly not family practice clinics that look like me. so it was to quench a health need or desire for great healthcare in the community. So that's, I wanted to be the Sal or the. The water, the fresh water for my people and my community also, my last name is Brooks, which is like a water kind of word, like a Brook.
And so quench water Brooks. It was one syllable. I felt that I could, use it for other branding if I decide to do any verticals. Awesome. I really enjoyed the waters out of the water and said like really quench a need. So that's awesome.
Quench clinic. And if you haven't been to Dr. Brook's website, you definitely, you get that sense of, what you're speaking about right now with the water being ever so present on all of your pages.
So I totally love that. And thank you when you, so one of the things that also that I loved is like your website. It's not quench clinic.com. It's quench.clinic. Yeah. And so can you tell us about how that decision was made when you decided on quench.clinic versus a.com or dot something.
Awesome. You pull out all the stories.
I have a story about this too. I got . I have a friend who actually opened a mobile clinic in North Carolina and hers is must.clinic. And so she was the first person that I saw that had a different dot. But my other story about this is actually how I ended up joining entree business school is that it was March or I had put in my notice.
And I'm like, oh, I need this website, cuz I, the next step to figure out how to actually get a DPC is you do all the things on the checklist. So I got the bagels DPC check. I was just, oh my favorite, love I was doing the checklist. And so I had figured out the name I really wanted to do thrive, but Lee in Chicago now he's in North Carolina.
He has a name. I didn't know him now. Now I do. I went to a DPC Alliance and he's my friend. That's the DPC world. It's so small . But I wanted a website and I wanted I, I really liked the kind of clinic play on it, but I bought 20 other websites, because I didn't know. And I spent like $3,000 and that night I felt so sick.
What am I doing? I'm gonna spend all my money doing this business. I don't wanna know what I'm doing. So that same night, like the morning I signed up for entre business school, that was like the, what put the fear me. And I'm like, I need help. I need somebody to help me with these decisions.
Cause I don't know the right decision. How it's going with the doc clinic. I like it. I'm a nerd. And I like that. It's different patients. Don't always understand it though. So I have to be like, it's www quench clinic though. I like the simplicity of quench.clinic. And then some people try to do the.com after as well.
But I don't think that's a big issue when I look at my analytics, people are finding the website. But yeah, that's I, my friend had my friend also had it and I thought that's clever. I like that.
And, just to speak to your success just within the first month you reached over 50 patients and now you have over a hundred patients.
And so the fact that it has been less than a year and you, but at the time of this recording and you have that many patients who have found your care so valuable I would say they're definitely finding you, so that's
awesome. You know what I find, I think a nice website is good, but my website one, I made I still need to tweak it and I need to go on five and get somebody.
Like I had somebody offer to remake it on a different thing, but patients don't really care that much about a website. Like when you start doing it messy, the things that we think we have to do that have to be perfect. And this is really what the business is. The patients don't care. It doesn't matter.
The website is functional. It is able to take, a enrollment fee or it's able to take the annual membership. And that's really what they care about. Yeah. I try. Get to have admin time and think of ways to make it better. But the things that I think they need are not the things that they need. And that's, you know, what I'm learning about being an entrepreneur, right?
Like listening to what they really want and need. So rather than spending tens of thousands of dollars on a beautiful website that does all the things, I have a functional website that does what I needed to do right now. And when would I have capacity you to do more or when I find the need to do more, when I'm trying to grow and it's not growing the way I need it to then maybe I'll tweak it.
Yeah. So that's also what I'm learning is to do as needed.
Such amazing, words of wisdom for a person who might be in your shoes before you decided to pan in your, six month notice. So I think it's really important because, sometimes we hear, on the DBC Facebook groups, especially the ones for physicians, oh, I need this, I need this. And then you'll see the comments like, whoa, let's keep that overhead low. And yeah, what you say is very Sage wisdom. So yeah,
and I returned all that money after I joined the class. I'm just like, I'm gonna keep three days now, not 20. And I got all my money back and use it to buy a coach.
Instead of spending it for websites that I'm not gonna use, it's you know what, let me figure out the important stuff.
in terms of. Not necessarily buying websites, but if you're buying domains, there's different ways to, go about buying them.
And Google domains about $12 ahead, depending on what, type of ending it is. But definitely if you have something that's not MD, it's gonna be more or, yes. Something around healthcare. Yeah.
But like, I don't think it's actually that much more. Yeah.
I I think a little, but not really. You can also do.health so there's other ones I thought when, because I'm thinking about doing the spot and the fitness that I could then, change the ending and that's the landing page. Yeah. While I was just getting up to go, I just, I did go to five and have somebody literally just create a, like coming soon landing page for $5.
So you don't need much to.
And when we talk about supporting small businesses, when we talk about supporting our own, DPCs in our own individual communities, fiber is definitely a lot of, individuals who are putting their skills out there to help other small business owners.
So definitely a place to explore if you haven't been there yet. Now I wanna ask about how you found your space, because this is also something that I love asking for people who are, in those first, three to five years of practice, because you are going to remember things differently than someone who might have been, in practice for five or seven,
So I'm now I'm so thankful for the space I have. I am subleasing from another physician for $700 a month. And literally I found it by knocking on doors. That's I didn't go through a realtor. I was in the area where I wanted to be, and I just started every clinic, dentist acupuncturist. If it looked like they maybe did something medical or had an exam room, I was asking I got a lot of no's.
I got a lot of, I would get cards from like cousins or the local restaurant to give to the front desk staff. I got a lot of front desk staff not sending me to the owners and a lot of no's, but I got one a lucky day. Actually that day I found two spaces. One was like a fee for a um, They did cash based care on their own, but they would take like a percentage, which I'm like, maybe I'll do that.
I don't know. And this one, the, it was the owner of the building and she was leasing to a physician, but he was out ill. So she was like, he could probably use your help. He could probably use the extra time and she coordinated it. And I think because she wanted the space filled, she's helped me.
In fact, she actually just put my name on the clinic's outside billboard to get me busy. I was on vacation and I think she doesn't see enough patients. So she was like, we gotta get you some patients. So it's, people come along on the journey and they help you. Like when you start doing the things like it, they show up.
So I, I just knocked on doors and eventually somebody said, yes.
And I think that going back to when you saw Dr. Berger in her single room space, when we talk about keeping overhead low and you saw that you can be efficient and you can be a physician with a single room.
Yes. Just with the space to focus on your patient
even after I saw hers, I think I listened to , this podcast, and somebody had mentioned they were in their home and all sorts of things.
The patients don't care. They really just want you. Yeah. Like patients, I feel like my office, you know, it's kind of, MIDC century modern and in my mind. I want Amanda's space, but , you know, mine is it's OK. The patient's this is so nice. I. but they really just want you and they will take me anywhere.
And it's really about relationships and talking to people and that's what business is. That's what entrepreneurs just like taking yourself out of your comfort zone and asking
when you were approaching opening day, I, this is a, another question that I love asking new business owners, new DPC owners, because again, you're right , within that first year.
So in the, monthly, leading up to your actual opening day , what did you focus on when September was rolling around and October was about to hit and quench clinic was about to open its doors.
That's another good question. You have all these good questions. So I was ending my employed position.
So I was actually like in a rat race to finish all my charts and get all the stuff done. And I had part of getting prepared to open was like every day or every working day, I did an hour of admin time. So it was like, again, making sure the malpractice was in place and, I had the supplies I thought I needed, but again, what you think you need are not what you necessarily need and you should let the patients tell you it was getting the word out about it as well.
Although I did a lot of pre-enrollment so I already knew, when I opened I had I think 30 or 50, I, again, now it's a blur. But I had, people who had signed up a few of them had signed up for the year. So I had a little nest egg, nice of enrollment. So it was really.
Excitement that this thing was really gonna happen. I had a lot of trepidation though. Like the first month was like, why did I blow up my life? Like this? What am I doing? What did Katrice are you having a midlife? S what are you doing? But it worked out and there was a mix. It was one, I was really proud of myself that, and the same advice that I tell my patients, do, if you're unhappy, change it, take small steps until you get there.
But it was a lot of nervousness as well. And I didn't have everything like I, I mentioned the failing forward. Every day it was like, oh my gosh, I don't know how to order labs. Or my R is not working. I ended up switching EMRs and just all of this stuff, all, but it was a joy, like going to work when I did, my first day was amazing.
Like I, I saw maybe two patients amazing all of it, all the little stuff that I normally hate doing. I started doing prior offs, like all this stuff. It was such a joy that, oh, I get to do this for myself. This is mine. So it was also a dream and surreal, even now it's surreal. Like I'm so happy that I get to go to work and I, it gets it's my clinic and I can do what it, as I feel I can help the patients, how much I want to.
We create little workbooks, we have groups and all this stuff I wanted to do. I'm able to do.
Especially with what you just shared, you're celebrating your wins.
And I definitely would say, that's something that it's really hard sometimes in the thick of, the million and one things on your plate. And then you have to cook dinner and then you have to restock your stuff on, by ordering your materials or whatever, but it can be easy sometimes to forget even, one win that you had that day.
I, I love your authenticity there because even when somebody is not necessarily seeing it themselves, when.
Somebody like me is hearing your story. I can hear that, that the celebration there in your enthusiasm. So I just love that. Yeah. And so now I wanna go into your, be better show because yeah, I, I love, when people have patient focused, material, ways to reach your patients in different manners.
And for you video has been working on TikTok as well as on your YouTube channel. On your be better show, you have different episodes and you talk in your very first video that you did progress over perfection. I wanna hit that hard because when you talked about you are in Dr.
Una's a business school and this idea that you have with progress over perfection, you. Sometimes there's this stigma of I can't start yet because, and then you fill in the blanks, but how did you use that mantra, that progress over perfection and jump right in. And what would you say to others who might be hesitant to put progress over perfection in place for their lives?
Oh, I love this too. This is like Dr. Una's message. This is how we get people to the action. We, as doctors, we are, so we are such perfectionist and it's important to be perfectionist because our errors can count, can cause people's lives. So we are taught, like you ha it has to be right and you have to check it and you.
Just do it, but it turns out life is not like that. Medicine is like that medicine has very little margin for error. In some ways it's not some ways it is experimentation with the patients, but it's really in, in the doing that anything happens and I get. I get caught up in myself, too in my brain.
I have, social anxiety and a lot of stuff of it. It needs to be right. And it's not perfect, but really just the tiniest little, anything will multiply if we do more of it. And so it's just. Doing something to get towards where we're trying to go. And that is life that is, starting a new diet, taking your medicine.
Anything is we can't, we are not perfect. We're humans. It's not going to be perfect. Like even in our mind, if we wait until it's perfect, it's never going to happen. Like my version of perfection, because again, we're such high achievers is like this amazing thing. And as doctors, like our B plus work is pretty good, right?
Like when you talk about the B better show, I'm embarrassed. Like I hate the show. Like it's so awful to me, but it does serve my patients. They come back and say, Hey, you know, you did this episode and I watched it and it really helped me. Or now I'm doing this, or now I'm eating the vegetables and I'm doing the episodes based really on the patient's needs.
Like my patient asked me to do an episode about grief because they had just lost their mom. It was like, you know what. I see this a lot. I deal with grief a lot. This is, my wheelhouse and that's what I'm telling patients, right? Like you don't need to be perfect if you try to eat a plant based diet, it doesn't have to be plant based a hundred percent of the time.
It's literally anything just being better. That's what it is. Just any little thing in that direction of where you're trying to go is enough and it's something and something, plus something adds to more and it's just starting just start and any, just try And that's why I used to my life.
Cause otherwise I wouldn't be here. Like it's just the littlest and just added up. But what I also like about Dr Unez that she is also a person of excellence as well. So it's not just any little thing, but again, our doctor worked our B plus is a slam dunk, right? There are people doing videos that have no qualifications or who don't have the MD or D O so just do it.
We have so much to give all of us. Like I get from everybody I get from my patients. We all have so much to give just give and do be better.
When you talk about that, and I know you, it it's hard to see ourselves.
It's hard to hear ourselves sometimes. And I will give you like so many compliments because, you can tell every episode, you, you add the lower thirds where you have your name, and you didn't in the first one. So it's you can see exactly you as you work on your craft, as you work on what means the most to your patients and to you, you are you're learning from that experience.
And you're putting those lessons into play the next time. So
I'm sorry. So that's good. I'm so glad you take on that. That's amazing. And that's so true and it, I find it easy to do things that are service based. If I'm doing this for a patient, it may. I'm going to do it well for the patient, cuz that I love serving.
Yeah. That's so good that you picked up on that. You're right. It did get better. I got screamy. And just I'm gonna make this better cause yeah,
no you can you can easily see that when you are in that bird's eye view, like I get it when you're the one doing it. We are hard on ourselves.
And so I wanna ask there because as a business owner, having things like workflows, changing the needs that your patients have changing, how do you put into play progress over perfection? When it comes to workflows at quench
clinic? Oh, great question. I also listened to the patients as well. So this past two months, I finally got a VA thank God that has helped me so much.
And we've had to actually work out , but that was something I was figuring out. Day one is like, when I sign up a new patient, how do we onboard? How do I get them to sign the form so that I can get their records released? And what is the workflow? What does that look like? That's a part of progress over perfection cuz anything, right?
The first thing that we have is what we have that's, you know, the first SOP and we're just gonna make it better. We're just gonna improve it and tweak it until it gets better. And with my team my VA, every time that like there's a hitch, we talk about it like, Hey, that didn't work. I want, let's do it in this way to make it work okay.
That we saw how I want that time. Let's fix it. And even my personal stuff, like I struggle with timeliness. So I'm working on that. So I had to create systems in my life. Like . So now that I work for myself, it's I have to be at clinic 30 minutes before, my day starts because otherwise I'm running in and I don't like the way it feels.
Yeah. And I don't have a boss to say I do have myself, but to say that. And so I have to have these systems of like, I have this buffer time before I come in and where I come in and I check the email, I do this and I literally have a checklist. It's on whiteboards where I do it, that my brain works that way.
I need systems, businesses, need systems. This is something that we find out, doing business, but I can go rogue too, and I have to have a way to check it. Anything you track, you change. The us reevaluating things. We're better. All the same stuff. And I'm telling my patients, I'm using these same tools to build my life and to build, you know, a successful life.
So in addition to the things that I do when I get to clinic, so I have my checklist of what I'm doing for clinic. I have also a Meow view of what I have to do every single day to make sure that my life runs smoothly. It's the little goals to get to my big goal. So I, these are my ABCs or my it's actually my B, C, D E.
And it's a, my five most important things. And it's specific for me,
My B, C, D E list of the day things that I make sure to do every day. And I think that helps me grow as a person and not as a person and as a business. And it makes sure that I cover all the things like I have my big goal.
And then I created these small goals, the process to get to the big goal. And it's my B, C, D E. And it helps me get to the big goal.
When you say C D, is that an mnemonic for something for
to me, you can make one for you or your top five things. It's just my top five things that I do every day.
So number one is Ash Changa. So I'm doing Ash Changa yoga, so that's movement, right? So it's movement every day. Number B or not number B letter B is to be bright. And that has to do with how I'm eating. It's this whole bright line eating a whole thing, but it's to eat healthfully and to be mindful of trying to eat my five servings of fruits and vegetables and not eating processed food.
So I call that being bright C is to connect, to make sure that I connect with people that includes my family, but also it includes connecting as part of asking and with my business. So making sure that I'm connecting to my dream 100 and just people to the, to my contacts that I need to connect with D is to do.
And that's to just take action to, to have. Every day to take some action. And E is twofold is to either encourage and to educate. And they're both ease and they're slightly different. So encouraging myself includes listening to podcasts, staying in a good mindset where I'm staying encouraged in business and not quitting, right?
Like just staying in community and educate is reading books and educating myself so educating about business, about medicine, whatever that I'm working on education. It also includes books for pleasure, but I don't have to tell myself to do that.
These things, if I'm not careful, I may not do them. And they're the work that's important, but not urgent. So I have to make sure that I do.
Awesome. That's really hyper focusing on the things that are focusing you on you.
Me, I really love that. Yeah. Awesome.
How did you go about finding your VA and how did you go about making sure that they were gonna be a good fit for your
clinic? Great question. I talked about this with a lot of practice owners. I found my VA at hello RA, but I had to go through a lot of VAs to get her.
I think I tried another, I think I tried a VA with Upworks and I had tried specific tasks and there's a lot of training with whoever you have to have onboarding and you have to have the expectation of onboarding. So I went through maybe two VAs with hella RA that.
One, we did the interview and I thought it was gonna work. And just there was some natural disaster or something. And then I had a few interviews that I didn't think that they would be a good fit, but when I found the one that I thought would be a good fit, initially I would give her kind of tasks to do and see how she did it.
And then I also interviewed her to see if her goals align with mine though, I felt she wasn't super forthcoming with her goals. Cause even now I'm just like, what do you need? How can I help serve you? And it's I just wanna be with you. And I'm like, you know, and it might be something cultural.
So after finding the, after finding one that showed up consistently, cuz that was, that's just a big thing, right? Sure are you doing what I asked you to, you know, will you show up will you try to produce what I asked you to produce? Even if it's not right. You know, We're not perfect individuals, so I don't expect her to be perfect.
But I initially when she came on, I had her watch a bunch of videos from my EMR to get comfortable. I had her do like a test patient and you know, do the things with them. Try to get fax with them and set up their profile. And then we would this is a tip that I got from another person in the business school, Karen Kaufman, who has an allergy practice, but to have her on FaceTime with me or on Google with me the whole day.
So when I'm in clinic, we're both on zoom together. And so she'll scribe for me during clinic, which is amazing. That was a big reason why I left my employee practice was cuz they wouldn't gimme a scribe. Now I bought my own scribe. if I was the person I am now, then maybe it would be different.
But she scribed for me. She also like preps the charts before, the day before or whenever they make the visit, that's actually a process change. She was doing it the day before, but then her internet went down and like, wait, so now we have to change this. Now when they make the visit, you have to prep their charts.
But that's just a part of, team improvement. Um, So she'll sit on the call with me the whole day she'll scribe. She'll send in referrals. Do Do all the stuff it's made my. So much easier. I wish I had done this when I was employed. Like it's, it is life changing for me.
It's my biggest business expense. So with hell nine 50 an hour. And like I said, my office is only $700, so I'm keeping my overhead as small as possible. But even with trying to keep a low overhead to me, a VA is worth it for my life. So I went to Mexico for 12 days and then I went to Atlanta and having a VA literally kept my practice afloat.
Like she was able to communicate with the patients. I didn't even have phone access, but she did. , I found her because other practice owners were talking about VAs. I'm like, what is this? You speak of a VA, and initially I had somebody try to help me with social media, like just again, try to piecemeal it, but I love my VA from hella rage.
Like I, I should have done it sooner. I need to get an office manager. That's my next hire that I'm thinking about. Or in the office managers, if she could do like RN or, you know, phlebotomy, that would be amazing. But my VA and me for now that works out, I only see five people on a very busy day mm-hmm so the rooming and stuff, I don't have to have an ma for though.
It would be nice.
Well, I gotcha. And as you grow, you can, you have right. You have the increase of patients and you have the increase of income to support that. And, making sure that your practice is always feeding into that ability to make your patients and yourself feel valued and feel seen.
Yeah. That's, a way to check in with is this investment person, VA ma whoever it is worth my. Money because it, it helps or doesn't help me achieve my why. So that's
awesome. Yeah. Oh, one more, one more thing about that.
, one of the reasons why I even got her was my patients were complaining like, again, I was feeling over at this point, my clinic had of probably gone as grown as 75. And it was like, this is more than what I feel comfortable handling by myself. . And so a patient complained that she didn't like not having the zoom link in the email that got sent out.
And like that things were just like all over the place. And it was like, you know what, I wanna to provide better service and what I was providing wasn't enough. And I needed help with that. So it was like I need help. I need additional help. And then I got Kevin Mackey to help build an app.
It could do the zoom thing with the Serbo. Although now Serbo offers that as part of what they have, but it was really out of my patient's needs. So whenever things are focused in that way, if somebody's telling me like, oh, I need this, it's I can solve that problem. I can fix that. Or for myself, like things are falling through the cracks and I'm creating a job that I don't, I won't say that I don't love, but is not supporting me in the way I need it to, that's not functioning for me the way I need it to.
And so getting help has changed my life and my feeling about the practice. Now I love my patients. Again, I don't have to deal with what time is my appointment. Exactly. Yeah, there is, there's a buffer and I, that works for me.
when you. Look at your every day now with the VA on board, what does your week look like?
Cause you said, five patients on a really busy day, but do you have time set up in your Sebo? This is block time for admin time. This is block time for marketing. What does your weekly schedule look
like? So I'm working on that. So right now, like I mentioned earlier I am doing locums.
I am not supporting myself with my DPC completely. And that's kind of a choice. I didn't want to create a business or a job that I hated. I didn't wanna create a job that I felt trapped in because I left corporate medicine because I felt trapped. So it was really important for me to build what I wanted to have.
And so I'm still doing locums where I am strictly an employee and I see 30, 25 30 patients. But to me, that's a very kind of shift work. I go there, I make this money. It allows me to live the life lifestyle that I wanna live and float my DPC a little. So I have my locum shifts. I do probably I'm still doing quite a bit of locum, so I do maybe 10 to 12 shifts a month still doing, you know, a lot of that but so say that's two, three days in my in my week, the weeks where I'm in quench my hours are 10 to four, so I see patients 10 until four.
That's usually two or two days a week. Now I've committed to giving my patients these days. But I was having space in my schedule and I don't love that. So if I don't have, if there's not the demand, then I remove the supply. But so my day is 10 to four. I try to get there or get to the office around nine 30 because I start seeing patients at 10.
We, I get on a call with my VA at nine 30. We'll get into the same zoom. And then we'll do a huddle for the day of, this is what we need to do. During that time is admin time. Cause it's previ, it's pre patient visit. . I also am working on scheduling 20 minutes of admin time a day, just so it's not an hour of admin time.
It used to be when I was employed, but now it's just, it's shorter. So it's 20 minutes of admin time and that includes scheduling stuff, but not necessarily doing the stuff. that's where I send out my ask or whatever I'm doing for marketing or my marketing stew. I'm not doing all the things I need to do.
Dr. Unah has very specific things that she wants me or not. I create the things, but things that I know that I should be doing, my marketing stew, things that, my post and my shows and, so I have 20 minutes where I schedule that stuff. And then the actual doing of the stuff I hire out to my VA to do as much as possible.
So because I'm only seeing patients maybe two days a week, she's still doing 30 hours a week for me. So she is still full time for me because that's what hella race requires. So actually I think I have two models. I've thought about splitting her with someone else, but I still have a lot of stuff to do in my clinic.
I'm still trying to get all the records for the people and all this stuff. So she'll work on creating assets for me. So I'll send her like things that I'm working like diagnosis that I wanna create, like PA patient handouts and things that we wanna create for patients that we give all the time.
Like I'm all about lifestyle medicine. So I'm all about giving people the tools. So she'll create that when we're not face to face working. I do schedule admin time. I don't usually take a lunch. I don't know why I'm abusive to myself, but because I'm only working two days a week, it's I'm just gonna power through this.
And it's 10 or four. That's my dream life. I dreamed of waking up on my own and then going into clinic and it being leisurely. And that's exactly what I'm doing in terms of like marketing stuff. So I have the entre MD coaching weekly. And so then I schedule time usually after that to work on stuff, but I'm not doing it the way that I should, I need to do better.
So I'm working on that. The recent mastermind is like, I'm doing it. So now I'm doing it.
one of the things that you had highlighted is when you come to clinic in those 30 minutes before you, you start seeing the patients, you have your checklist. So can you give us a little bit of an insight as to like Dr.
Brooks's everyday checklist that you go through before you start clinic?
Oh, sure. So I make sure that I clean my space usually clean for the night before, so I clean my space. I check my emails, so I look at all my emails. I check my w site to see if anybody has signed up. I check cebo then I check the patient portal to see what messages came in overnight.
I have spruce, I also check that, but using my VA will create encounters in cebo for me from spruce. So I check that and respond to all the patient's questions that I missed overnight. I try to do that daily because we're DPC. So I try to just, get back to people even on the weekends right now.
That's why I like the 100 number, cuz it's my patients are so low demand for me personally. So I check all this stuff. I check my email, I check Serbo. I check spruce. At that point I tried to put in. 10 minutes on Facebook, checking that as well, and just responding to people and participating in communities um, and being present at that time.
I'm also supposed to post my TikTok that I've either cued or that I do. But they're one minute things. I also do them in between patients if they're quick, but like a one minute thing, but I'm working on that. What else? I review the patients that I'm going to see. Usually I've done that the night before, but I'll check their records and my my VA will prep the charge for me, so they all are already prepped.
So I just I'm reviewing like, okay, we're doing that. What else? I check I'm checking the mail when I come into the office, cuz usually, you know, it's a private practice, so I've gotten, you know, new orders and medicines and all this stuff. So I go through that, I'll put some of that up if it's, if I have time to open the boxes, but if it's overwhelming, we set it to the sign.
So the end of clinic what else am I doing?
that's a lot for 30 minutes. So
is it it's really great. Sometimes it's sometimes it's it's it has to be done in between the patients depending on what it is, but sometimes it's not, sometimes it's nothing, if I didn't really get messages and not too much has happened. I
can. I can just see sometimes when my days are like that the emails or the messages in the portal because I'm also in Serbo, I'll be like, oh, I have to go open their chart from this hospital to pull out that record.
Cuz I didn't have that in my system or whatever. So sometimes it's a rabbit hole per message that I did. So yeah. But I think that, you know how you said, like if it's too overwhelming or it does not need to be done this second, it can have its time set for a, a time that will work for you and your patients.
So that's great.
And I also create buffers between each patient. The, yeah the max I have hour long visits in person and I have 40 minute virtual visits, but all my visits have buffers because one, I talk too much and I have poor boundaries that I'm working on. sometimes I'll take the length of the buffer to have the visit or after it's just to prep and to do all the other little admin stuff or the stuff that comes up.
Cause a lot of stuff comes up in clinic every day, little stuff. It's
so interesting that you say that because there was a practice that I saw where in their scheduling, it said the visit is 15 minutes, but you're scheduled for 30 because 15 minutes of that is for reentering physician wellness and admin time.
And when we talk about transparency with our pricing and DPC, it was a different level of being transparent with regards to these are the boundaries of the time that you will be given. Yeah. And this is why those boundaries are in place. And then, I love even when we talk about boundaries, I just wanna throw this in there because of the tie with Dr.
Berger, she had her ice fishing post and it said, like doing virtual or doing virtual visits today or something like that. And I was like, that it's learning from each other that our own boundaries can be. Even more Finese sometimes that can really help. But I love, your gem with regards to, if it's, if it doesn't have to get done right now, we can park it and address it at its at the time that we set aside for that.
Yeah. I love that idea about being transparent about the timing, because I don't even now on cebo. I think that the patients can see how long the visit is, but they don't see how long that I've scheduled it for. And I don't like, I'll tell them, oh, my next visit is, a little later, but I, I need this time to recoup, but I love even telling them that Hey we're gonna have to have some time afterwards where, we focus, I focus on reentering just to be most present for the next patient.
Good. Patients love that. They, what we find out is we're human, and it's just really a shared human experience. And is navigating that.
and when you remind them, cuz I know that I've had to do this in, especially in fee for service when I was always running behind, I would tell people, but you know that you would get the exact same care if you needed it.
So yeah. I love that. when we talk about boundaries, one thing that I wanna ask you is something that you also brought up in one of your episodes of the being better show or the be better show is you had strategies around life that you had learned from an NBA, basketball all store.
Yeah. And yeah. And so one of those things that I thought was so interesting because sometimes it can. Result in us pressing our boundaries and having to recognize them is to say yes. So you talked about when you have opportunities and there are amazing opportunities and wanting to say yes to the world, because you're open to opportunities.
You're open to growing your practice. You're opening to more people understanding your value. I wanna ask how do you work through saying yes. And putting that spirit out there and also respecting your own boundaries to put a hold on whoa, I took a little bit on a little bit more onto the today than I needed to.
I that's one question I love, in terms of the space that we're in as DPC physicians and business owners. So I wanted to ask that for
you.
Very good question. And it's hard. One when you're a DPC and an entrepreneur, We could say yes to everything, right? Like there, there's not these external stuff, but there is like there's kids and other stuff.
So I love the saying yes, and being open, but what business and being an entrepreneur has also taught me is also the value of saying no to stuff. Because by saying yes to stuff, I'm also saying no to some stuff. Cause in order to do that stuff I can't be in two places at once. So I've gotten even stronger doing DPC and saying no to stuff and letting people know my boundaries upfront because I wanna be so transparent.
I'm now like Hey, by the way, I'm this this is gonna overwhelm me and I might shut down. So I want you to know that. Right. Or, being scared and saying yes to opportunities because that is how we grow. And , I do. I come upon things that I fear a lot. Like I mentioned, I have social anxiety, so this is all really a stretch for me.
Although the more you do it, the less of a stretch it is here. We are just, creating but saying yes to those things and just doing it messy, being better, showing up, being scared and just doing it, but learning and knowing so well to also learning how to say no.
And it's so hard to say no to patients, but DPC also forces me to do that. Like people will call and they are just like, oh you really charge that. And it's I do that. That's really my price. I'm sorry that you can't see me and that, you know, it's not in your budget for what you're valuing and you would rather use this, but that's my boundary, right?
In order for me to live and create this thing, I have to. Not bend for that, or I have to not change my boundaries. And then I've gotten so much clearer in that doing entrepreneurship. In fact, I've heard the, and I'll probably say at this, maybe the, one of the best parts about building this business is who we become in building, right?
Like I'm just, I'm a better person now and clearer on who I am. And it's easy to say yes, from a place of clarity and authenticity, like I'm able to say that aligns with what I wanna do. Yes, let's do that because I'm clear on who I am, what, who I am in this world, what I'm trying to give and doing every day makes it clearer.
And I'm able to say no to some stuff too. Cause it's again, I'm, I would have to take some from somebody else or from something else in order to do that. So I'm clear on what is really important to me.
And one of the things you had said yes to was this interview that you did with the Milwaukee business news BIS times.
And so I know I quoted that in the beginning, but the title of the business article was Wawa. Doctor launches out on her own with an alternative clinic model. And so I wanted to ask there because when people have the opportunity to be featured in a, a a public forum, newspapers, radio shows, whatever it is I wanna ask about how did you come to be interviewed and when the.
Interview was done. Did you participate in the art in the name of that article or did the journalist create that name herself?
All right. I have some matches for you and I have stories as well. So this, you are also a part of this story as a lot of my stories, because I do find your podcast.
So valuable. So I think there was someone, maybe the doc in San Francisco who does like the LGBTQ care. But he got a mentor from the SBA. And so I did the same thing after listening to the episode, I took action and I reached out to them and I got a mentor, like a score mentor with a SBA.
And so then he hooked me up with this interview Hey, I know this person. And so literally through networking and meeting people I got interviewed for this story. I had no decision in any of it. Like she just interviewed me. And made what she wanted to make, which was nice. It was a flattering article and I'm very thankful.
It was through his connections that I got this, which is, and you don't have to pay the SBA anything. Right. Mm-hmm like, They just wanna help you. So another great resource, this guy still helps me and mentors me. Through you. Thank you.
Awesome. No, and score.org.
If people are not aware, that's where to start to find your mentor locally. And you're so right. I have a score mentor myself. I actually attended, this is so funny, but score offers business classes. Mm-hmm so it's a, they can be series of classes around social media, around, your business canvas around networking in person, but you don't necessarily have to attend score classes.
In your neighborhood. So if there's something virtually offered. Yeah I was attending classes in Rhode Island at seven o'clock Pacific time because they didn't have those classes going on in my local score chapter. And so even if you have a score mentor, your score mentor can can help you, but it does not limit your access to other score classes out there.
I'm so glad you brought that up. I find score.org and an invaluable resource and yeah, Dr. Naser Mohamed is who you were talking about. Absolutely. He mentioned that. So thank you so much for bringing that up. And one of the things too, that I wanna ask is when the journalist came, did that person bring along with them a photographer or did you provide headshots for the
article new?
It is a new age. I never met the photo. I never met the journalist in person. It was a phone interview. So those were Professional shots that I already had because on the DPC checklist, it was get, you know, professional shots. So when I was still employed, and I don't know may or June the year prior, cuz it just came out in January.
I did professional head shots so that I could, do media stuff because I'm a checklist person and it worked. And so now I use them all the time. So these are assets that, I had different looks in one day and it's still, I'm still using. .
the value of headshot, I cannot agree with you more because you never know when you're gonna need them. You never know when someone's gonna ask for your CV. So those are things to always have on hand, lifetime.
So that you're able to, shoot out. Oh yeah, you need XYZ. Sure. I got a headshot for you. Sure. I got a CV for you. But definitely it wasn't
that expensive. It was, and on the grants game of things and fun, right? Like I felt like a celebrity. It was fun to do head shots.
That's awesome.
And no, you have some great ones and, you know, especially with the, that article in particular, you have the shot where you're on the blue couch and it's just very, it's so in alignment with your brand. So I love that.
Now I wanna ask a specific question about your practice because you offer aesthetics. And when you talk about your big goals incorporating, a bigger space with physical therapy with group sessions and everything that you talked about.
One of the things that you're currently offering is aesthetics and being a woman and a physician of color. Mm-hmm I wanna ask and highlight on that because Providing aesthetics is one thing, but providing aesthetics for different skin tones and being able to treat people appropriately based on, their individual makeup.
I wanna ask about how you approach that in your everyday aesthetics care to your patients.
Oh, I love this. I love what you asked this, that you also picked up on this you're so stoop in Milwaukee there's actually, I don't think there's a black dermatologist. So in my past eight years of practicing in my clinic I was doing, I wouldn't call it quite aesthetic medicine, but I was doing a lot of black skincare, a lot of skin here or a lot.
DM for skin of color because my patients, they could go to the dermatologist, but they would often come back to me or they wouldn't want to. And so I had to do it became just this passion of mine, similar to mental health. So treating skin of color is a passion of mine also because I have skin of color.
And so it was just learning about myself and skin and I love it. And it is a special set of skills. And it's not that, you know, it's like peds in general medicine, right? Like children are not just little humans. Right. Don't we can't, we can't use the same things. And we can't just assume that things are the same, but in smaller doses.
And so, skin color is also like that. And so I, it's a, I'm doing lots of learning. I feel like I'm doing my own residency on aesthetic medicine. I found. Mentor aesthetic medicine. I found I'm mentored by Dr. D fungi, but you know, there's the Julie DUNS and the people in DPC that also do aesthetic medicine that I also follow.
So I joined aesthetic groups, I've done aesthetic CES, and it's just a whole new kind of pivot. But to me it's so much fun. Like I love it. I love this kind of this vertical and my practice for me, my ideal client or my ideal patient is that same person. Right? Mm-hmm So my ideal patient. A 40 year old woman with some kids, who's probably, you know, a person of color.
They're also interested in their skin like me, so it, it goes right in, in line. I've had a patient who she was actually on F M L a because of mental health. Like she was having a really hard time with living her house with anxiety and depression and lots of stuff. But what she really was fine on focusing on was a skin regimen.
Like when we would have our visits and she would be like, yeah, I'm, you know, the structure that she gave me for my skincare, I'm still doing to me. I can even get her to go on a walk. But she was willing to do this self-care. And so, you know, our appearance and self-care, and it's a really kind of complex thing.
And I find that similar to mental health it's another kind of branch of medicine that I do that my patients benefit from. It feels my cup as well.
One thing I wanna ask on going off of that is when you talk about CME, when you talk about your mentorship that you've had personally, I wanna ask for those people who are taking care of skin of color, what resources do you recommend specifically that they look into, whether it be CME classes or resources?
Because I know that there was, I believe a medical student in the UK who was creating a textbook about dermatology for skin of color specifically, and the dermatologist who was talking that I was listening in on had no idea about this textbook. So I wonder what your best resources are.
Yeah.
Actually have a textbook. It's a skin of color textbook that is like. My Bible and it's written by lots of black, and Asian dermatologists. I follow a lot of them on social media. So carolyn Robinson is a big one and she has the cut Chicagoland area. In fact, Carolyn Robinson is the reason why I first found out about DPC because she does DST direct specialty care.
So I was on her website, like about to go see her. And she was like, oh, I don't take insurance. I'm like, huh, what's that? And I think that's why I went to the podcast store and I found you honestly.
in terms of best resources, if other people are looking specifically for resources centering around dermatology for skin of color, what resources would you recommend?
So a great textbook that I could use and consult all the time is tailors dermatology for skin of color. It is wonderful. It has color photos of conditions in black skin and skin of color, which you don't typically find.
So I use it all the time. I open it for patients in the room. I also have, I think it's CEOs both talks for Asian skin. So that's in terms of textbooks, but I also follow dermatology content creators. So again, there's Dr. Carolyn Robinson. There is Dr. Hartman. His name starts with an E I can't think of his first, the first letter, but they're all on Instagram.
They're dominating Instagram, follow them. Cause they'll also show you how to use Instagram for physicians, and how to teach the public. So they're just good to follow in general, but they are, they create content for skin of color. And just for patients. So they're also good resources and there's all, there's always CES and there is the skin of color society that they have CES.
So lots of resources.
Yeah. Amazing. Amazing. Thank you. So I will include those in your blog,
so
Now I wanna close with a big question now that you are in DPC, you have over a hundred patients, you have your VA, you have your checklist, you have your goals.
What would you say to somebody who is in fee for service or is in training to become a physician either employed or a DPC physician? Because , when you talk about what you pick up from other people's interviews, I would love to hear your perspective because you have heard so many stories, but yet you also have your own take on things.
So I wanna provide hope and that, at this point, if you're. This deep in the podcast, hopefully you've listened to the rest and they're all gold. There is better out there and you can have better and you can create the life you want. We are not stuck and we're not victims and we can do it.
And even, if it doesn't look like someone else's, you can create your thing. That is the beauty of the time that we live in now. It's do it. If you are unhappy, you do not have to stay unhappy. I felt so long, so hopeless, really so hopeless. And then I found you and I found Dr. Una and I started asking the questions of why am I, Unhappy and what really would make me happy and doing so self-healing, so really, get to know yourself and what's going on internally because you have one life to live.
We can't live our lives for other people. We have this one time on this earth and we need to make, if you wanna make the most of it, you don't need to do anything. I wanna should you. But if you feel the desire for more, or you want to make an impact in your own way and you have this spirit, then you should do it.
And maybe it's for you, but it's okay if it's not for you. Because I think some people do DPC and find maybe it's not what they thought it was. I found the opposite. I love it. It is more than what I thought it would be. It is done for me more than what I thought it could. But if it's not that's okay too.
Find your thing, whatever it is, right. Be true to you. And walk in that and you don't have to apologize for who you are to anybody. You can just be you and do what serves you and makes you the best. You
amazing. Thank you so much, Dr. Brooks for joining us today. Thank
you. This was so good. This is again, literally a dream a year ago. I was listening to your podcast. Like I, it is crazy that I'm on it really, because it was, it changed my life. It was really a vehicle that you, like I said, you gave me a S mortgage board of options of how I could practice and I could put my own flavor here and here I am in real time doing it with the real clinic.
And it's amazing. It's amazing. We can do that. , I'm so happy. Thank you.
Just fills my heart and it definitely, helps me feel my why. So I really appreciate that. Thank you so much.
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