The Direct Care Podcast For Specialists

Send us Fan Mail What if you shouldn’t listen to me? In this episode, I’m sharing three reasons why I might not be the right person to guide you into direct care. I’m not a guru with a perfect success story. I’m still evolving, testing ideas in my own practice, and learning from what works, and what doesn’t. I also don’t want the traditional version of success. I work about two and a half clinical days a week because I value freedom, time with my family, and having a life outside of medicine....

Send us Fan Mail Why do I answer my own phone? Because I can. And honestly, that’s one of the things I love about direct care. I don’t need a big staff, layers of people, or a complicated system between me and my patients to run a successful practice. In this episode, I’m talking about why I still answer the phone, collect payments, schedule patients, and keep my practice simple—and why the traditional idea of what a “successful” private practice looks like can actually get in the way of the ...

Send us Fan Mail Before you can build a direct care practice, you have to start thinking like a direct care doctor. The insurance model has trained us to think that more patients means more money, that we should only offer what insurance covers, and that taking insurance is the “safe” choice. But what if those beliefs are exactly what’s keeping you stuck? In this episode, I break down four insurance mindsets you need to unlearn if you want to build a thriving direct care practice—and start th...

Send us Fan Mail What if the “safe” path in medicine is actually keeping you from practicing the way you want? After nearly 20 years treating eating disorders, Dr. Lauren Hartman left the traditional healthcare system to build Aspen Grove Adolescent & Young Adult Medicine, a direct-care practice in Berkeley, California. We talk about leaving security behind, betting on yourself, charging for your value, and designing a practice around time, autonomy, and the care patients actually need. D...

Send us Fan Mail What happens when a physician decides she’s done practicing medicine like a robot? In this episode, I talk with Dr. Cheruba Prabakar about leaving employed medicine, building a direct specialty care practice, creating memberships, offering concierge-level surgical care, and hiring another physician. We also talk about her journey to becoming The Fibroid Doc and the book she created to help women better understand fibroids and their treatment options. A conversation about buil...