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The Second Annual Summit is Here – 348

In today's episode, John provides an overview of this year's Summit designed to make your clinical practice great or move on to a better alternative.

With a lineup of expert speakers and a comprehensive agenda, the Summit aims to equip attendees with actionable strategies for improving job satisfaction and exploring nonclinical opportunities.


The second annual Nonclinical Career Summit runs this week. It’s not entirely nonclinical in its scope, however. We have several presentations about starting and running a cash-based private practice. It features twelve experts who share inspirational messages and valuable know-how live over three nights.

It's called Clinical Practice: Make It Great or Move On

And beyond building your cash-based practice, our speakers will show you how to create an asset that can be sold later. Other experts will discuss MedSpas, Infusion Lounges, and other cash-only businesses, using Real Estate to diversify your income and assets, and several nonclinical side gigs including Expert Witness and Medical-Legal Prelitigation Consulting, Medical Affairs Regulatory Consulting, and remote SSDI Application Reviewer.

To learn more check it out at nonclinicalcareersummit.com. Remember that there is NO cost to attend the live event. And if you can’t participate in the Summit, you can purchase the All Access Pass videos (only $39 until April 16, 2024, when the price increases to $79).


Our Episode Sponsor

Dr. Debra Blaine is a physician like many of you, and her greatest challenge was fear. The whole concept of leaving clinical medicine was terrifying. But she is so much happier now as a professional writer and a coach. According to Debra, “It’s like someone turned the oxygen back on.”

If fear is part of your struggle, too, she would like to help you push through those emotional barriers to go after the life you really want. Click this link to schedule a free chat.

Or check out her website at allthingswriting.com/resilience-coaching.


Trends in Addressing Physician Burnout

Physicians have faced increasing stress and burnout in recent years due to corporate employment structures in the healthcare industry. There are several basic approaches to preventing these common consequences of clinical practice.

  1. Aggressive Contract Negotiation: Physicians are placing a greater emphasis on negotiating employment contracts to safeguard against burnout inherent in corporate settings. While not discussed extensively in the summit, this strategy is crucial for those considering employment.
  2. Identifying Root Causes of Dissatisfaction: Physicians are focusing on identifying and addressing the underlying causes of dissatisfaction, whether it's related to the nature of their vocation, organizational policies, or interpersonal dynamics. Analyzing these factors allows for targeted solutions to alleviate stress and improve job satisfaction.

Highlights of the NonClinical Career Summit

The Nonclinical Career Summit starting on April 16th features a lineup of expert speakers covering various aspects of nonclinical career options for physicians. Here's a sneak peek at what attendees can expect:

  1. Speaker Sessions Overview: The Summit will host twelve live presentations, spanning topics from evaluating the need to leave clinical medicine to exploring diverse career paths outside traditional practice settings. Each session offers actionable insights and practical advice tailored to physicians and other clinicians seeking alternative career paths.
  2. Logistics and Registration Details: The Summit will run over three consecutive evenings, starting on April 16th, with sessions starting at 7 p.m. Eastern Time. Live attendance is free, but registration is required to access the sessions. Attendees can opt for the All Access Pass for $39, providing access to session recordings and bonuses.

Summary

This week's podcast previews the 2nd Annual Nonclinical Summit featuring 12 expert speakers addressing ways to create a clinical practice outside of the corporate style of healthcare and nonclinical career options. Attendees are encouraged to register early to secure their spot and gain access to valuable resources aimed at supporting career transitions and enhancing job satisfaction.

NOTE: Look below for a transcript of today's episode. 


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Episode 348 Transcript

Over the past few years, I've noticed that there is a backlash to the increasing stress and burnout in physicians resulting from employment by large corporations. It seems like the burnout's getting worse and it's related to being employed, losing their autonomy, and really working in that sort of healthcare industrial complex, seeing as many patients as you can in every hour. So in response to that, I think physicians have begun to implement various strategies to prevent or address the burnout, the stress, and the dissatisfaction that's coming.

So these are some of the four trends that I have seen. It's not everything, but I see these as something that's getting more and more common. So first is a bigger emphasis on aggressively negotiating employment contracts.

After all, if you understand that employment leads to dissatisfaction and burnout, and maybe if you've been through it once already, to some extent, you should be able to address the cause of that burnout by building safeguards into your contract. We won't be addressing that in this summit, but it is something I've noticed, and you can take a listen to my interview with Ethan Encana, who's an MBA slash JD, which was posted in February 13th of this year. So if you listen to that, we'll be talking a lot about trying to protect yourself from the things that cause your burnout in your contracts, if you decide to go with the employment route.

Now let's move on to the next one, which is more in keeping with what I want to talk about today. And that is a big thing that physicians are focusing on now, and people are teaching about is finding, identifying, and somehow preventing the root causes of your dissatisfaction and addressing it in new ways. So is it your vocation itself? Is it the practice of medicine? Or is it the organization you're working for and their policies and procedures? Maybe they don't staff properly.

Is it the boss that you report to that's causing your stress and anxiety? Sometimes a fierce conversation can solve the problem. Sometimes moving to a different clinic or hospital will work, but you need to spend the time really analyzing what's, what, what it is about the work that's making things worse. And is it something that you can resolve either in the current situation or at a future one? So that's something we don't talk a lot about on the podcast, although I have had one of our summit speakers, Dyke Drummond, on the podcast to talk about that, but that was several years ago.

Number three is the physicians are implementing new or updated practice models that put more control in the physician's hands. Things such as direct primary care, concierge medicine, and other forms of cash only medical businesses. And this can solve the problem in two ways.

Number one, a lot of times doing that requires you to be in your own practice. So you're starting your own business. So you're not working for someone.

Doesn't mean it's not busy. Doesn't mean it's not challenging, but now you have that autonomy and you're in control. And the other reason is that it's oftentimes the insurance companies, which are driving this whole approach to medicine, where you've got to see as many patients as possible, because they have certain schedules, payment schedules that are difficult to, you know, earn a living on.

And a lot of the drive to see a lot of patients is because of either Medicare and counting it worked RVUs or trying to see so many patients an hour. And that can be overcome by starting your own business and taking cash. And you figure it out in that setting.

Since you don't have to hire two or three people per physician to do the billing, you can cut costs in that way and you can generate income. So it's another thing that I see growing in the past two or three to five years, even. And then the other one is just finding a part-time job.

It's something you can do on the side because you can then either cut your clinical back to part-time also. And then you get to do two different types of jobs. One, a clinical, one, a non-clinical.

You can find, you know, you feel like you're seeing a little more variety of things. You have better hourly compensation sometimes with the non-clinical side, especially those we're going to be teaching at the summit. And again, if it involves starting something like either a practice that just doesn't bill insurance or a med spa or an infusion lounge or a weight loss clinic, you're still at the end of that able to sell it.

And that's a big asset that can really be a big chunk of your retirement and really builds to what I would call it through that process, some career diversity. The other thing that's nice about doing something like one of these side gigs or side jobs is that they can grow to be a little more part of your week as you retire from clinical, let's say, as you get older. The other is it's protecting you so that if your clinical job, which may depend on employment by a hospital or part of a group, that would be protected.

That gives you that leverage, that independence that you otherwise wouldn't have if someone decides to fire you. Okay. So that's why, because of those last three issues that I've been noticing, Tom and I both, that's why we're calling this year's summit clinical practice, make it great or move on.

So there are ways to improve your practice as it is, where it is, or ways to improve it by moving and doing other things. And there are ways to make it better by splitting it with another non-clinical career. And so that's what we're talking about at the summit this year.

And I think it's very apropos. And the tagline is recognize dysfunction, fix it and protect yourself or seek better opportunities. So you can see, as I go through what we're covering during the summit, it kind of brings all of those in and those kinds of terms will probably make better sense to you.

So let's get into the specifics of this year's summit. Last year, we were, just like last year's summit, we're holding it on three consecutive evenings, starting the day after this episode, day or two after this episode is released. I might be releasing it a little early to give people a chance to go through this before the summit actually starts.

And we're doing it that way in the evenings live to enable as many clinicians to attend the free event. So as many people can come for free, making it because we know that Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday evenings are the best time. If we do it during the day or on a weekend, people usually cannot even come for one or two of the hours of presentations.

But by doing it in evenings and doing it live at night, people can carve out some time and maybe at least watch one or two or three of the sessions each night. Now it starts on April 16th at 7 p.m. Eastern time with four live presentations at the top of each hour. They'll end 50 minutes later, followed by a 10-minute break.

And each presentation includes a live Q&A during the last 10 or 15 minutes. It continues on Wednesday, April 17th and Thursday, April 18th, obviously each night starting again at 7 p.m. Eastern. We're holding it on a typical Zoom meeting platform that most of you are very familiar with.

Questions will be submitted using the chat. It could get a little bit confusing if you got a we're going to use the chat and either myself or Tom Davis will curate the questions. You know, sometimes we get two or three that are very much similar and we'll kind of bunch those together.

But that way we can spend 10 minutes at least getting, you know, answers to really the burning questions that come up during the presentation. I think I mentioned earlier, live attendance is absolutely free, but you have to register in advance to attend. That's the only way we can get you the link to attend.

So you just sign up on the link that I'll give you in a minute. And once you're registered, you can come and attend as many or as few sessions as you like. To save your spot, you're encouraged to register using the link that one of our speakers may have sent you.

You know, you might be watching this, but maybe you're already a student of Dr. Drummond's or Dr. Unachukwu or anybody that's helping us here, which I'll be going through in a minute. And you definitely can use their link and then they get credit. If it's easier or if you don't have any link from anybody else, then you should just go to nonclinicalcareersummit.com and you'll be given an option to sign up for the live free event.

And that's also the same link for purchasing the All Access Pass, because we understand that not everybody can attend all the live sessions. So we're making the recordings available for a very low price. That's just $39.

And given all the work that goes into putting this together, that's pretty darn reasonable. Now it does increase on the day that the summit starts. On Thursday morning, the price goes up to $79.

I'm sorry, not Thursday morning, on Tuesday morning, when the summit is starting later that day. But in the morning, it jumps to $79. That's on April 16th.

So if you want to get that really best price, you should sign up for the All Access Pass by Monday, April 15th. And again, it's $39. So you have to get that registration in by midnight on that date.

And again, it's also available at nonclinicalcareersummit.com or by using any speakers affiliate link if they're sending those out to you. All right, well, let's get into the details about the speakers and the lectures. Basically, like I said, we have four presentations per evening.

They're all live except one is being recorded ahead of time because the speaker is actually not available during the summit. But we didn't want to not include him in this thing. So let's just start with the first one.

And I'm going to say that these are not in the order in which they're being presented, but kind of in the order that they flow in my mind in terms of addressing the main thing we're trying to do for the summit. So for example, Dyke Drummond, Dr. Dyke Drummond, very well known. HappyMD is what he's known for.

He's got a podcast. He's been doing this a long time. He's coached thousands of physicians.

And he's going to be speaking on Tuesday night, the first night. And he's going to be answering this question. Do you really need to leave clinical medicine or is it just the job? And the official title, is it just a shit job or boss you want to escape? So really, it's not necessarily clinical medicine or clinical nursing or other clinical specialties that you're working in.

It's oftentimes other things that lead to the dissatisfaction and the burnout, the anxiety, things like that. So he's going to take that question head on. And how do you determine if this is really you should leave medicine or whether you should stick with it, but resolve the problem in a variety of ways.

And some of the ways he's going to talk about is just how you take control of what you're doing, listing the alternative practice models that might solve the problem. And if it is time to leave, let's put out that ideal job description process. So you can assess when you're going somewhere else, is it likely to be a better situation? So the next speaker I want to talk about is Mike Wu Ming, a very good friend of my podcast and myself, and he's written a book.

And he's going to build on what Dyke is telling us from the standpoint of what his experience has been with owning cash-based medical clinics. Okay, so it's still a practice. It's a medical clinic.

And he just describes sort of the mindset changes you have to go through to make this happen. He'll list the four or five financial levels of a physician, what that means, what it means to be a CEO, not only of your business, but of your life. He'll talk about ways to provide medical services outside the insurance industrial complex, if you want to call it that.

Let's see, he'll compare different types of cash-based medical clinics and where he sees future growth. All right, the third one, again, an expert on business in general, Dr. Una, Dr. Nneka Unachukwu. She goes by Dr. Una.

She has one or two podcasts. She's coaching a lot of physicians, and she's got many courses. And she's an expert and does a lot of speaking about creating a successful business.

In her case, I think is a good mix of people she's worked with who have created healthcare businesses, not necessarily a medical practice. Some have created different medical practices. And so she's going to talk about the business practices you must adopt to be successful, to get into a little bit about the importance of branding and marketing.

And again, she likes to focus, and I think she'll touch on this as well, how to build a practice or a business or both that has value and then eventually sell that business for cash out at the end, which again, I've mentioned earlier, is a great way to help segue into your retirement. And I've got just a hint of this because I'm currently in the process of helping my wife sell her own business, which she's been running for 15 years. And so we're going to just find out what it's worth at this point.

And it wasn't really something that we dwelled on up until the last couple of years. And I guess I'd mentioned now that if you do build a business of any sort, you should really always try to think of the eventual selling of that business because we all eventually go away. And even if it means turning it over to a partner in a medical practice, how does it happen? What's the value? Thinking about those things.

So those are the kinds of things that Dr. Una are going to be talking about. Then to kind of round that out and from another perspective, Joe McMenamin, who just was on my podcast, I think last week, but yeah, and he's going to be talking about corporate entities, meaning, you know, LLCs, corporations, things, how to create a legal situation for your business that makes it safe, protects you financially, keeps the tax concerns in mind. He's also going to touch a little bit on contract negotiations or starting a new business, other things to consider besides just the corporate structure.

And he'll be comparing those different legal entities that can help make your business successful. So the next is we're going to get even right into the nitty gritty of some of these cash-based businesses. See now a med spa, many physicians are familiar with, I wouldn't call that a medical practice.

And I don't think you need a license to run a med spa, although it helps if you're a medical director, if you're doing procedures that obviously are licensed and you have insurance for that. Now practice insurance, but she's going to talk about this. I believe she owned her med spa for 15 years.

She started it from the ground up. She grew it, she marketed it, she branded it and she sold it. And they happened not too long ago.

And she actually was able to segue into staying on as a part-time medical director. And so it really worked out well. She's very happy with how things went.

And again, I don't think she was thinking about the sale of it when she started it, you know, 10 or 15 years ago, but it worked out well for her. So she's going to share some of her experiences with that. Next two guests, our speakers are Jennifer Allen and Kimberly Lowe.

Now they're actually each doing an individual presentation because Jennifer is a physician and Kim is a nurse. They're going to discuss their particular experiences and reasons for going into starting an infusion lounge or an infusion center. And both of them will spend a little bit of time talking about what the heck is an infusion lounge.

And it turns out it can be a lot of different things. And let's see for Jennifer, she's going to be focusing too on the basic services they usually provide and how hers is different and who's sort of best qualified, or let's say has the best background and personality to do something like this. And a little bit about the first three steps, prepare to open your own infusion lounge if you decide to do that.

Now during Kim's session, and Jennifer's I think is on the first day, Kim's is on the third day. Again, she's going to tell you why she thinks it's a great investment and describe how the partnership model, you know, is working for them, for her in particular. She's going to hopefully mention some of the other businesses that nurses might be able to get into in healthcare that, you know, not everything is open to a nurse, you know, medical practice per se isn't.

But even in some places as an NP or an APN, you can do something like that. But she's going to talk about, you know, nurses and kind of side businesses that they might be doing that are similar to what she's doing. And she might end there with three mistakes that you should avoid when starting an infusion lounge.

Well, that brings us up to Paul Hercock. He's been on the podcast twice. He's from the UK.

And he created, well, he has a business that uses medical regulatory consultants or medical affairs, regulatory consultants to help meet the needs of the MDR regulations, medical device regulations in the UK and in the EU. Paul is a physician and he's been working in this field for a long time. And so he started hiring people to do this for him, for his business, which is called Mantra Systems, I believe, Mantra Systems.

And then because he was having difficulty finding people, he created a program to teach people how to become medical regulatory affairs consultants. So that's what he's talking about. And I think it's going to be very interesting.

You'll be working remotely for companies that are mostly in the UK and the EU, but you can work from the United States. In fact, we have a lot of people that contact me that are from the EU. You know, they maybe have traveled, they've immigrated to Europe and then they decided to come to the US and they may have a degree from somewhere in Europe, UK, France, you name it.

And there's no reason why they can't continue to do work back there remotely because things are just so easy to do in that way these days. And in fact, Paul told me that they often look to hire American physicians to do this because they have a lot more experience in dealing with the FDA. The MDR regulations are actually relatively new in Europe and the UK.

So that's going to be an interesting one. Very useful, very practical. Then Dr. Armin Feldman is going to come on.

He's been on the podcast a couple of times and he's going to tell us all about medical legal pre-litigation, pre-trial consulting. And I've discussed this before, but it's an awesome side hustle. Don't have to be licensed to do it, but you definitely have to have a medical background.

And he's going to explain exactly how that works, why there's a growing need for the service and how to get the necessary skills to do it. That brings us to Gretchen Green, who's pretty well known for teaching hundreds of physicians, how to become expert witness consultants. She's run her course nine or 10 times.

And so she's going to give us a quick overview of how to become an expert witness, how to build the business side of that, what to do, what not to do, what it entails. And so this is going to be really interesting and an overview for what she does. And then the last one is Tom Davis, known to many of you, I hope, as my past business partner in Newscript, which we've closed down back a few months ago.

But he's here helping with the summit. And he's been involved with companies that provide social security disability reviewers. And it's something that I didn't quite understand or wasn't well aware of.

I'm definitely aware of an independent medical examiner, but there are also other layers of the process of becoming, let's say, qualified for disability payments from social security. And it's a very niche area, but you can definitely get a remote position as a social security disability application reviewer. And it really piqued my interest.

I want to learn more about that. And so this is something that almost any physician can do. I believe they need to be licensed to start out, but I'm not sure you have to remain licensed.

And there are full-time jobs available as well as some part-time jobs, from what I hear. So I'm really interested in hearing Tom describe exactly what that entails and who's qualified and how we would apply for that. And then finally, did I say finally with Tom? There is one more, and it's kind of the icing on the cake.

And it's a little different, but we thought it would be nice to have Dr. Pranay Parikh talk about real estate and how it can make physicians' lives better. So we're not talking about becoming a full-time real estate investor or manager, but as I spoke about earlier, when you can build different sources of income, different sources of assets over time, then why not do that and add that to your portfolio of income streams? And so we thought, well, it's not a clinical type of thing. It's something many physicians are interested in.

So he is going to be talking about real estate. He spent, I don't know, the last five or 10 years in real estate. He actually has a real estate company that he's partnered with.

He's worked with others that you have heard of on the physician side of things. And there's so many different ways of investing in real estate. We thought, okay, Pranay, come on this summit and talk about how a side hustle in real estate can bring emotional and financial rewards, list the benefits and challenges of investing in real estate and describe, we're going to have him describe the three most popular approaches to investing in real estate.

That wraps it up. That covers the 12 lectures that we're bringing during the summit. I'm really looking forward to learning from all of our speakers.

They'll be sharing their wisdom. You'll be able to follow up with them later if you want to. Some of them are going to probably be promoting the summit with us.

Some of them are going to be providing their own bonuses. So if you are already following some of them or on their email list, watch out for their emails because they will be helping to promote it. So even if you're using the free version, if you register through them, you can get any bonus they might be providing as being part of this.

Our team is really excited to bring you this year's summit. We're doing our very best to bring you actionable advice that will help you to improve your current situation, establish your own practice or healthcare business, or create a lucrative side gig so that you can maintain your autonomy, improve your income and satisfaction and support your transition when you withdraw from clinical practice. So there's a lot of benefits to this year's summit.

Sign up for free right now or purchase your all access pass by going to nonclinicalcareersummit.com. The day that this is being released, the all action pass still only costs $39. And I think it'll be that way for another day or two. But if you're listening to this later, you'll have missed that $39.

So on Tuesday, April 16, the price will jump up to $79. Still a very reasonable price if you need to get the recordings. And then after that, when the summit's done, they'll actually jump up in price again.

But for right now, if you want to get in early, go to nonclinicalcareersummit.com. And to make things easier for you, instead of remembering that link, you can find the show notes and some other links by going to nonclinicalphysicians.com/make-your-clinical-practice-great.

Disclaimers:

Many of the links that I refer you to are affiliate links. That means that I receive a payment from the seller if you purchase the affiliate item using my link. Doing so does not affect the price you are charged. I only promote products and services that I believe are of high quality and will be useful to you. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

The opinions expressed here are mine and my guest’s. While the information provided on the podcast is true and accurate to the best of my knowledge, there is no express or implied guarantee that using the methods discussed here will lead to success in your career, life, or business.

The information presented on this blog and related podcast is for entertainment and/or informational purposes only. I do not provide medical, legal, tax, or emotional advice. If you take action on the information provided on the blog or podcast, it is at your own risk. Always consult an attorney, accountant, career counselor, or other professional before making any major decisions about your career. 

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Expert Witness or Medical Legal Consulting: Which Should You Pursue? https://nonclinicalphysicians.com/expert-witness-or-medical-legal-consulting/ https://nonclinicalphysicians.com/expert-witness-or-medical-legal-consulting/#respond Tue, 28 Nov 2023 16:06:35 +0000 https://nonclinicalphysicians.com/?p=20920   Episode 328 In today's episode, John helps listeners to decide whether expert witness or medical legal consulting best aligns with your needs. From decoding the nuances of medical documentation to navigating the uncharted waters of depositions and court testimony, John shares a roadmap for physicians eager to diversify their careers. Our Show [...]

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Episode 328

In today's episode, John helps listeners to decide whether expert witness or medical legal consulting best aligns with your needs.

From decoding the nuances of medical documentation to navigating the uncharted waters of depositions and court testimony, John shares a roadmap for physicians eager to diversify their careers.


Our Show Sponsor

We're proud to have the University of Tennessee Physician Executive MBA Program, offered by the Haslam College of Business, as the sponsor of this podcast.

The UT PEMBA is the longest-running, and most highly respected physician-only MBA in the country. It has over 700 graduates. And, the program only takes one year to complete. 

By joining the UT Physician Executive MBA, you will develop the business and management skills you need to find a career that you love. To find out more, contact Dr. Kate Atchley’s office at (865) 974-6526 or go to nonclinicalphysicians.com/physicianmba.


Did you know that you can sponsor the Physician Nonclinical Careers Podcast? As a sponsor, you will reach thousands of physicians with each episode to sell your products and services or to build your following. For a modest fee, your message will be heard on the podcast and will continue to reach new listeners for years after it is released.  The message will also appear on the website with over 8,000 monthly visits and in our email newsletter and social media posts. To learn more, contact us at john.jurica.md@gmail.com and include SPONSOR in the Subject Line.


The Role of Physicians in Translation and Interpretation

John sheds light on the pivotal role physicians play in translating and interpreting complex medical concepts. He highlights instances where clinicians, whether employed or in a consulting role, act as bridges between the clinical and administrative realms.

Examples include positions in clinical documentation integrity (CDI), quality improvement, utilization management,  and informatics, where physicians serve as interpreters for those without a clinical background.

Nonclinical Career Paths: Expert Witness Consulting and Medical-Legal Consulting

Delving into nonclinical career options, John explores two distinct avenues—expert witness consulting and medical-legal consulting. He elaborates on the differences between the two, discussing the responsibilities, compensation, and prerequisites for each.

Expert witness consulting, involving legal testimony, is contrasted with medical-legal consulting, a role centered on reviewing, summarizing, and advising on cases without the necessity for courtroom appearances or depositions.

Both freelance consulting businesses offer the benefit of producing hourly revenues that exceed those of typical clinical activities. Yet, they can be done remotely, and with no risk of the kind of lawsuits that practicing physicians must endure. 

Summary

For those considering expert witness consulting, John suggests Dr. Gretchen Green's comprehensive course and SEAK, an organization that offers resources and directories for physicians learning to be expert witnesses. Dr. Armin Feldman's offerings cater to those interested in medical-legal consulting. Both courses cover essential aspects, from legalities to business setup.

NOTE: Look below for a transcript of today's episode. 


EXCLUSIVE: Get a daily dose of inspiration, information, news, training opportunities, and amusing stories by CLICKING HERE.


Links for Today's Episode:

Download This Episode:

Right Click Here and “Save As” to download this podcast episode to your computer.

If you enjoyed today’s episode, share it on Twitter and Facebook, and leave a review on iTunes.

Podcast Editing & Production Services are provided by Oscar Hamilton


Transcription PNC Podcast Episode 328

Expert Witness or Medical Legal Consulting: Which Should You Pursue?

John: I am doing this on my phone. I think the clarity will be a little bit less than usual. I did a dry run earlier and it was kind of breaking up a little bit, but we'll do our best today. I just want to spend 10 or 15 minutes talking about a particular topic that interest to me, and it's something I've noticed. And then I will talk about the generalities and then work my way into two different nonclinical careers that one might consider to do either as a side gig or full-time, although only one of them can be done as a full-time job.

I'm in Scottsdale, Arizona. I normally am in the Chicago area where I live most of my time, but my wife and I bought a small house out here and it's been getting renovated and we're just kind of out here to check on things. And so, that's part of the issue. But let me get started.

One of the things I've noticed when physicians or other clinicians, anybody's looking for a new position, a new job, particularly in healthcare, even if they decide to do some consulting or even if they're employed, that the jobs that open up for physicians and other clinicians involves either translating or interpreting things.

Because what you do is you start with your one foot in the healthcare medical world and then you obtain some expertise in another area that benefits physicians, benefits healthcare organizations. And then as an employee or as a consultant, you can be the person who can educate and interpret the language and the concepts that maybe are foreign to one side or the other, just like the CEO of a hospital doesn't really understand what a physician goes through for their education, training background and all that. It doesn't really understand how nurses and physicians and therapists interact with patients and kind of bond that we have.

And this is why we get in trouble sometimes because we're trying to fit a square peg in a round hole because the CEO is thinking in terms of the bottom line and finances and making things as productive as possible, and the physicians, nurses, therapists and others are thinking about, "How can I make this patient better? How can I help this patient understand what's going on?"

That comes up a lot and I'll give you some just simple examples. These are jobs I've always talked about in the healthcare field, in hospitals. Let's say clinical documentation improvement. That is a position as a physician advisor or medical director where you are explaining to your colleague physicians the rules and regulations around using the ICD-10 or the DRG system or whatever it may be. It's not really intuitive, it doesn't correlate directly with what we do clinically. In the CDI world, there's different levels. Usually three levels on the inpatient side for heart failure, for pneumonia and so forth. But they're all based on trying to figure out the complexity and then paying a higher amount for the more complex.

But it doesn't directly correlate with what we've learned as physicians and nurses in terms of treating those patients. And so, the physician advisor or medical directors interpreting and translating the concepts from one group to another. That's a great place to be. And there's a lot of jobs and they pay very well when you can find yourself in that important position of making that translation and making that connection and helping others get what they need. And at the same time, capture the true medical information.

Well, the same thing is true in informatics. A medical informaticist is translating to his or her colleagues. Concepts that need to be understood in terms of using an EMR or even beyond that, tracking data. And then it kind of extends into quality improvement where we have to maybe explain the statistical factors that are used in analyzing billing data to measure quality.

And again, it's not an easy to understand topic, but a quality medical director would spend a lot of their time explaining the p-values we use when we're looking at those statistical differences. And the reason why we feel that these comparisons between patients, between groups of patients, groups of physicians and their quality is really truly statistically significant and at the same time is risk adjusted, which is the big issue a lot of times in accepting quality improvement data.

Again, these are all interpretations and translations between these groups of people and get them to buy in and understand then learn how to do it better. UM it's the same thing. We don't think in terms of utilization management or benefits management when we're trying to take care of our patients, but if we do understand it better, then we can actually be more effective.

But one area where this comes up, which we don't normally think of as specifically this issue, but it is, and that's in any kind of consulting. And the type of consulting I am going to talk about today is legal. Medical legal types of consulting. And when I think about that as a nonclinical job, I think of maybe two sides of the same coin. Probably the most common areas where attorneys and physicians interact. And that is on one hand being an expert witness consultant or starting on expert witness consulting business, and what many of us now call medical-legal consulting.

Those are two really different ways of interfacing with the legal system as a healthcare provider. There are some opportunities in both of those for let's say a nurse or a physical therapist, something like that. Probably more opportunities for physicians. That's what I'm going to be speaking about for the next five minutes or so.

Let's compare those two types of consulting. Expert witnesses. Most of us understand what that means. Basically, we will provide services to an attorney and usually picking one side or the other in this case because it's usually because of a lawsuit that has been filed. And in this case it's often a medical liability lawsuit. And so, as an expert witness, you can be on the side of the patient who's accusing the physician of doing something wrong or missing something or failing to document something or failing to communicate. There's a whole lot of reasons why you can get sued.

And other expert witness consultants are going to be on the acute side, the physician side, explaining why the physician really did follow the standard of care. And that sometimes things just don't go well because it's the nature of medicine. We all die, we all get sick, we all have injuries that hopefully we treat properly and within the scope of practice and within the standard of care.

Now, an expert witness, number one, it's a very highly compensated physician. Let's say that you're going to be an expert witness for a family physician. Let's say you're a family physician. Now many expert witnesses, of course, are board certified, fellowship trained even in specific subspecialties, but there are a lot of internists, ER docs, family physicians who do expert witness consulting because you just have to talk to the standard of care, which most of us know very well because we work in it every day.

But it's very good pay. So, we'll start with that. Let's say I'm on a three star scale. I would say its three stars. Really as a family physician or an internist, if you take all the hours you work doing your medical records and everything into account, you'd be lucky to make $100 to $150 an hour. Because usually, let's say you're making $200,000 to $300,000 a year. If you're working 60 or 70 hours a week, that doesn't come up to that much. As an expert witness, you are going to be charging 2, 3, 4 times that amount on an hourly basis, and you get paid for every minute you spend doing that work unlike in clinical practice, which is why the numbers don't look so good.

That's one good thing about being an expert witness. However, most expert witnesses have to be in practice, active practice because they start to lose their credibility if they start to do that full-time. You can definitely cut back on your hours in clinical. And what I often talk about is spending, let's say you could easily drop 20 hours of clinical practice to do 10 hours of expert witness care or expert witness consulting and make equal to or more than you would've clinically. So, it is very well paid, and the more experience you get and the more time you've done it, then the better the pay gets and you can charge higher levels.

As an expert witness, you're doing three things. Basically you are reviewing charts and writing reports about your opinion. And then you might be attending a deposition and you might end up testifying in court. Now, most attorneys don't like to... Well, it's not that they don't like to go to court, but they prefer to have a settlement if they can. I think the patients prefer that. Oftentimes the physician prefers that or whoever else is being sued.

When you're involved as an expert witness, you're doing mostly chart review and report, and then you're doing a smaller percentage of depositions and then some go quite a while before they ever have to testify in court. But eventually it will probably happen if you do it long term. You obviously need to be licensed because you need to be in practice and you probably need to be board certified to do that.

Now, there's a different type of expert consulting called medical-legal consulting, specifically as a terms coined by Dr. Armin Feldman, who to some extent has actually created this specialty. And what's nice about medical-legal consulting is it still pays very well, probably double what you would make an hourly basis as a physician.

But it does not require testimony in court. It does not require even doing a deposition. And you're not acting as an expert witness. What you're doing is you're reviewing records here, organizing records, summarizing records, and then providing feedback to the attorney about whether the case should be pursued or not.

And these cases, which usually fall into this category are personal injury cases, workers' comp, automobile accidents, which is a type of personal injury. And so, you're putting what can sometimes be a very complex situation and in which an insurance company has refused payment or the insurance company of a business has refused payment. You've heard of these cases, you've probably been involved in these cases where one of your patients gets injured and it's sometimes hard to know for sure how much is organic, how much is secondary gain, are there ways to sort that out?

And so, Dr. Feldman came up with this pre-litigation medical-legal consulting where you as a physician will help to sort through that. And the thing about this is you don't necessarily have to be in active practice to do this. You just need to have a medical degree. It helps to be board certified in something. You don't necessarily have to maintain your maintenance of certification because when you're doing these reviews, you've narrowed your focus now down to injuries. And really you just need to know the basic physiology and the basic approach to evaluation and treatment. You can learn as you go and you can become an expert in this area with just a little bit of time and effort. And you're not worried about having this go to court. If one of these does go to court and you need a medical expert, then that will be an expert witness consult that will take care of them.

But as a physician, you can analyze, and again, some nurses do this as well looking at it from the nursing standpoint, but physicians are in a particularly good position to say that within a reasonable degree of medical certainty, either A, this is caused by the accident or isn't. B, what are some of the unrecognized illnesses?

And your main goal is to try to maximize the support and the payments to the patient. And if you look at it from that perspective, you're not trying to gain the system or take advantage of the insurance company or the employer. Usually workers' comp covers this obviously, but you're just trying to make sure that all those things that resulted from the accident, from whatever happened, are fairly compensated. And we've all seen patients who have what seemed to be a minor accident and then a year or two later they're still having problems.

They might have developed some long-term complication, what we used to call reflex sympathetic dystrophy, which is severely debilitating. And there have been many times where patients were not compensated and didn't receive the care they needed for something that was a delayed result of an injury like that. So, it's really an interesting area.

Again, it involves interpreting and advising and translating information and then putting things into a report. Both of these that I've talked about today are good ways to reduce your burnout, do something that you enjoy, apply all the medical knowledge that you have garnered over the years to a particular field. And in the case of expert witness, over time you can cut back your clinical time to 10 or 20 or less hours a week, do some expert witness consulting and make a better income than you would have burning both ends of the candle doing clinical work.

And in the medical-legal consulting, again, you could do that part-time, you could do it full-time and you can definitely make a lot of income without the stress of working in a high pressure corporate style environment.

Now I want to talk to you a little bit about some resources that we have available to us. And some of these I have promoted in the past. I'm not an affiliate for either of these experts I'm going to mention, but let me just tell you what I know here. If you're interested in becoming an expert witness, there are courses you can take to build the business standpoint how to do that legally and how to set up things as well as understanding how attorneys think, how they speak and being able to talk their language.

I've had Dr. Gretchen Green on my podcast two or three times, and she produces a very, very good expert witness course. I think it's completed over four or five weeks. It's rather intense. It has a lot of homework, it has a lot of supporting materials. Really she's been doing this now for three or four years and I've spoken with some of her graduates and they are definitely pleased with it. So, you can find that at theexpertresource.com/enroll if you want to learn specifically about that course. Because I think she has some other courses.

Now, there's also another resource for becoming an expert witness, which is SEAK. It's the same organization that puts on an annual nonclinical career meeting on a weekend in October. I think they're up to the 14th or 15th iteration of that. But one of the things they're also well known for is teaching physicians how to learn to be an expert witness. They have resources where you can get your name put in these directories that they then share with attorneys.

There's a lot out there about becoming an expert witness. And rather than struggle through it, you'd probably be best to take advantage of one of these resources. I think the SEAK resources mainly are on a CD or online, although I think they also have a live version of that. That's just something to think about as you can kind of morph your practice into half expert witness, half regular clinical practice.

Now on the other side, medical-legal consulting, Dr. Armin Feldman has his course. He does it in different ways. I actually took his course over a period of four or five weeks. There was a series of videos although he also sometimes does a live version of that. He also has a one year coaching program where he'll walk you through the entire process. I think it's a combination of videos and a lot of coaching from him to where you can have your practice set up.

This could be something for people that are in active practice, something where you're maybe semi-retired and there are definitely retired physicians who do this as well. As long as you stay current in this particular field, you can write wonderful reports, really help your attorneys to decide whether to move forward, whether to settle and you help get your attorney client's patients all the help they need for some long chronic result of an injury that occurred either through an auto accident or work related.

Dr. Feldman's website is mdbizcon.com. If you go there, there is a little intro where you'll learn more about it and they'll give you an opportunity to learn in a really quick fashion. Again, I took the course. I have, I don't know how many files that I've downloaded and went through multiple times. He walks you through, he shows you how to create letters to generate business. So you've got setting up the business, marketing, and so forth.

A lot of things Gretchen Green talks about in her course. It's pretty similar no matter what sort of side gig you're doing, you got usually involved in setting up an LLC and setting up your accounting and then doing marketing, creating all the fields, maybe setting up a website. And these are the kind of things that they both talk about in their respective courses.

The other thing that Armin has, which is really interesting, is he created a podcast which is designed for the attorneys themselves so that they understand how to work with a medical legal consultant and help them understand the lingo that we're using. And that podcast is called Physicians Helping Attorneys Helping People, although if you look up Physicians Helping Attorneys, you'll get to it. I think it's got at least 30 or 40 episodes now. It was just started about a year or so ago. I've listened to just about every episode. It's extremely interesting and very helpful and for no cost whatsoever you can really get an idea of what a medical-legal consultant does in this role.

I'm just looking at my notes here to see if I forgot anything. Nope, I think that's it. Remember that in a lot of your nonclinical jobs, you're going to end up being in the middle as a consultant who does interpretations and helps other people understand the other side of the equation of whatever it is you're talking about. And specifically the medical-legal has a lot of opportunities. And you might consider expert witness consulting or medical legal pre-litigation consulting.

All right, with that, I will close for today and I hope to see you next week.

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Many of the links that I refer you to are affiliate links. That means that I receive a payment from the seller if you purchase the affiliate item using my link. Doing so has no effect on the price you are charged. I only promote products and services that I believe are of high quality and will be useful to you. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

The opinions expressed here are mine and my guest’s. While the information provided on the podcast is true and accurate to the best of my knowledge, there is no express or implied guarantee that using the methods discussed here will lead to success in your career, life, or business.

The information presented on this blog and related podcast is for entertainment and/or informational purposes only. I do not provide medical, legal, tax, or emotional advice. If you take action on the information provided on the blog or podcast, it is at your own risk. Always consult an attorney, accountant, career counselor, or other professional before making any major decisions about your career. 

 
 

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Why You Must Consider Starting a Medical Legal Consulting Business – 281 https://nonclinicalphysicians.com/medical-legal-consulting-business/ https://nonclinicalphysicians.com/medical-legal-consulting-business/#comments Tue, 03 Jan 2023 14:00:24 +0000 https://nonclinicalphysicians.com/?p=11968 Interview with Dr. Armin Feldman In today's episode, Dr. Armin Feldman returns to update us on creating a medical legal consulting business, and new resources for learning how to do so. He first appeared as a guest on Episode 227, which was released a year ago.  Dr. Feldmman attended the University of Colorado [...]

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Interview with Dr. Armin Feldman

In today's episode, Dr. Armin Feldman returns to update us on creating a medical legal consulting business, and new resources for learning how to do so. He first appeared as a guest on Episode 227, which was released a year ago. 

Dr. Feldmman attended the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center for his psychiatric residency after graduating from the University of Wisconsin Medical School. For more than 20 years he practiced psychiatry and ran outpatient head injury rehabilitation centers around the nation.


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By joining the UT Physician Executive MBA, you will develop the business and management skills you need to find a career that you love. To find out more, contact Dr. Kate Atchley’s office at (865) 974-6526 or go to nonclinicalphysicians.com/physicianmba.


Medical Legal Consulting Business vs. Expert Witness Consulting

Dr. Feldman started formal consulting of this nature 15 years ago. His unique pre-litigation/pre-trial consulting aids attorneys in managing the medical elements of cases, raising case value, and saving time.

By supporting medical opinions with documentation from medical literature, he assists attorneys in helping their clients negotiate and settle legal disputes. In most cases, this enables patients to obtain necessary medical care.

Launching a Medical Legal Consulting Business

You need two skill sets to successfully pursue this career.

First, you must be able to research the literature regarding evidence-based medical care and explain your medical knowledge and experience to others. Second, you will need the business skills necessary to launch and sustain a long-term medical consulting firm.

During our interview, Armin describes how to obtain those skills.

Additional Resource – Dr. Feldman's Podcast

Armin and a former student, Dr. Michael Bummer, also produce Physicians Helping Attorneys (Helping Patients) a podcast that helps attorneys understand this new medical forensic field. It is also a great place for physicians who are interested in studying this type of work to learn more about it.

Dr. Feldman's Advice

If you love medicine and you want to… help people, injured people that really need this help… this is something you should consider.

Summary

In today's interview, Dr. Feldman helped us to understand this burgeoning new medical field.

He also describes his new online course, Start Doing Medical/Legal Consulting, which opens later this month. In it, you will learn how to start your own medical legal consulting business. The 16-video course is divided into 4 modules, each lasting two weeks, with a live Q&A with Dr. Feldman following each module.

If you want to begin this lucrative nonclinical full- or part-time consulting business, learn more by clicking this link. (This is NOT an affiliate link.)

NOTE: Look below for a transcript of today's episode. 


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Transcription PNC Podcast Episode 281

Why You Must Consider Starting a Medical Legal Consulting Businesses

- Interview with Dr. Armin Feldman

John: About exactly a year ago, I had today's guest on my podcast for the first time, and I was really interested and enthralled by the conversation because what he discussed was something I had never really been aware had existed. And since that time, he's been doing some new things, he's been increasing the availability to teaching other physicians to do what he's done. So, I want to welcome back Dr. Armin Feldman. Thanks for being here today.

Dr. Armin Feldman: It's a pleasure, John. It's always good to see you and it's always fun to be on your podcast. Instead of just listening, I actually get to do one.

John: Yes, I always find it fun to be a guest on another podcast. It's just like a normal conversation, just getting to know somebody. So, it's a lot of fun. You were on last time, about a year ago, and we were talking about this career that you have had for the last 15 or more years and a career teaching others to do it. So just tell us what that is and then you can segue a little bit into what's kind of new with what you've been doing.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Okay, great. As you know I do medical legal consulting. And what that really means is I work as a medical consultant in legal cases. I don't work as a medical expert. I'm working pre-trial, pre-litigation on those approximately nine out of 10 cases that these attorneys negotiate and settle. So, we work as medical legal consultants on the strategic development of medical issues in legal cases. And we're primarily working with personal injury and worker's compensation attorneys who work on the claimant side.

Now, although I'll say that any physician in any specialty can learn how to do this work. As you know, I owned outpatient head injury rehabilitation clinics around the country. I was fortunate enough to sell them. Thinking about what I wanted to do next. This was 15 years ago. I had testified as an expert witness more times than I want to remember, and I was thinking about what to do next, I thought maybe I could consult attorneys on any kind of medical question that comes up in a case. And I guess now the rest is history.

I've done over 3,000 cases. 13 years ago, I started training other physicians how to do this kind of work. And I've now through my coaching program, my conferences, my online training, I've now trained a little over 1,600 physicians around the country. We always work on the side of what I call the little guy going up against the insurance companies. These are injured people, injured no fault of their own, who then need to acquire legal counsel to get the appropriate damages and more importantly, from our point of view, to get the medical care that they really need. And this kind of consulting, really, in a formalized way was not done until I started doing this years ago.

John: Okay. That is definitely a different kind of animal from the usual expert witness consulting. And so, I want to tell you the way I look at it, some of the differences between this medical legal consulting and expert witness. And you can tell me if I'm right or you can add to it. So, let's do that. The expert witness generally is going to be involved in either a chart review, case review, and or a deposition rarely, and then even less rarely, testifying in court. And from my understanding the second two of those never happen in medical legal consulting that you do. Is that correct?

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yes, that's right. Another big difference is obviously if you're working as a medical expert in a legal case, you're working in your specific field. As a medical legal consultant, you're a generalist. You're answering any kind of medical question that comes up in a case. And our legal system allows and actually encourages this. A physician can answer medical questions in legal cases. And what makes what we do viable in many ways, is not only are these cases negotiated and settled, but we always back up our medical opinions with evidence from the medical literature.

In fact, when I first started doing this, my reports would go over to opposing counsel and the opposing counsel would call the attorney that hired me and say, "Why should I pay any attention to this? Dr. Feldman isn't an expert in, whatever, rotator cuff injuries." And the attorney would say, "Well, Dr. Feldman acts as a medical consultant for me in my cases, and if we can't get this negotiated and settled and you forced me to take it to trial, when I hire my retained orthopedic specialist, they're going to say exactly what Dr. Feldman said in his report. In fact, Dr. Feldman is relying on the same medical literature that my medical expert will rely on."

John: Yes. Very interesting. So, let me distinguish another thing here. Medical experts generally are still in active practice, not a hundred percent, but most of them are. And it's usually sort of expected. In this situation, do most of the people doing this, the physicians doing what you do, are still in practice? Still in practice, not in practice. Some are, some aren't. What's that like?

Dr. Armin Feldman: Some are, some aren't. But I'll tell you the majority are. Some physicians do this full-time. Some do it in lieu of retiring, but the vast majority of physicians do it as a part-time gig and they continue to do clinical work, and then they add this piece of nonclinical work to what they're doing. So, most of them are practicing.

John: Okay, good.

Dr. Armin Feldman: It makes a nice transition too for people that want to transition to nonclinical medicine. You can do it on a part-time basis. What I always say is you really need to have a minimum of about eight hours a week in order to do this justice and make it fly. And then from there, you can do it as many hours a week as you see fit and as you enjoy it and build up your medical legal consulting business.

John: Now, it seems that for the physicians that I know that do expert witness consulting, the rate of pay is significantly above their usual clinical pay unless there's some very subspecialized thing. A lot of them, when they do the expert witness, they will like you said, do that part-time too, work fewer hours, generate enough that they can cut back on their clinical. Would you say the same is true of this aspect?

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yes.

John: Okay.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Both things are true. Yes. The remuneration is handsome, and it does allow you to cut back on your clinical work.

John: Okay. Now I know that you have been teaching this and coaching people and so forth. I'm kind of interested in maybe a high-level view of what it would take for a physician to do this. What kind of training, what do they need to learn to do this? You can obviously get into much detail, but what kind of things are important in doing this kind of career?

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yes. I think for me and for the physicians that do this, this is what makes it interesting is that there are really two skill sets that you need to learn. One, of course, is you need to learn the medicine that you need to know to do this. Now you can do that as on the job without training. And when I say the medicine, you also need to understand how the legal system works, how law offices work, what things to do, what things to watch out for.

And I often tell physicians that are in my coaching program, my training program, almost everything that I teach is based on mistakes that I made over the years that you won't have to make. That's part one. And part two is you have to learn how to successfully not only start up, but successfully run a long term medical legal consulting business.

And the training is really on both of those things. So how do you go from zero, no business to up and running with your medical legal consulting business? How do you market that business? Meaning how do you get your attorney clients, how do you keep them long term? How do you operate your medical legal consulting business on a daily basis? That kind of thing. And then on the other side, how do you write the reports? What goes into the reports? What are the services that you're going to offer? Medical service, medical consultation services you're going to offer, and so forth.

John: Yeah, there's a lot of nitty gritty in there. I think I gathered from our last conversation and from listening to your podcast, which you can mention here in a minute. As a physician, we can understand what goes into a particular case. Doing this, you would've to research and oftentimes share that with the attorney you're working with. But like you said, it's something that each case is a little different. And so, I think the training that you've done in the coaching shows people how to do that too, how to collect that and put it together for the attorney.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yes, yes. There are actually 15, 16, 17 different types of services that I've developed for attorneys over the years. And so, every case is a little different. Every kind of service you're going to offer is different. So, for example, one attorney may want you to put together a comprehensive medical summary report that talks about the entire case, the medical damages in the case, the future medicals that are going to be needed and so forth that they'll submit with a settlement demand, a letter.

Another attorney may want you to do liaison with a treating doctor. Let's say the person develops severe migraine headaches after being rear-ended in the accident. And you get to the medical records and they had some headaches five years ago. And so, you might need to talk with the injured person's PCP or gynecologist or whatever, and say, "Hey, that headache that you treated them for five years ago, is that really a preexisting condition? Was that something different than what, well, I would call them a client, but their patient is experiencing now?

John: Okay.

Dr. Armin Feldman: A client of the attorney. There are a wide variety of services that you can provide as a medical legal consultant. That will depend on what the attorney wants, what the case indicates, and so forth. You're speaking about medical expert work. One thing that makes it different is our average case takes maybe somewhere between five and 12 hours. It's not as involved as being a medical expert. I would say probably maybe 80%, 85% of the time you're going to be writing a report. And that report, it's not behind the scenes. They'll be seen by insurance adjusters. They'll certainly be seen by opposing counsel in every case. They're often seen by judges treating doctors, IME doctors and others.

John: Very good. You are kind of really filling an important niche, an important step in this process. And like you said, most of the time they don't go to any kind of trial which most attorneys try to settle, almost every case at least in my recollection. One of the things I want to mention or ask you earlier, because you're so passionate about this, you spend so much time developing this, it's like a new specialty. And so, why do you love this so much? Why do you like this? You seem very enthusiastic.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yes. Well, that's a good question. And I think the absolute bottom line on that is, I think as physicians, one of the big reasons we all get into doing this is we want to help people. And this is a way that you can really, really help injure people in a way that they never had helped like this before in a nonclinical setting. And you get to see the tangible results of that help. The other thing is, if you love medicine, when you were in medical school, if you were enthused about it and you love medicine. This is a way to get involved in all kinds of various aspects of medicine and learn. Of course, the attorneys are paying you to do your research, but learn about all kinds of very interesting things.

Now, obviously, I'm in no position to do any orthopedic or neurosurgery, but I would put my knowledge base of spine injuries, rotator cuff injuries, complex regional pain syndrome, you name it, up against anybody because this is what I do day in and day out. I learn about various things that have come up in accidents and then what are the conditions? How do you treat them and stay up to date on all of the medicine?

I'll tell you a very quick story. I was talking to an attorney client last week and he said, "Hey, I have a case in which a woman developed a very bad hiatal hernia and esophageal reflux after being reared. She had two surgeries. She still can't swallow properly. Is that accident related?" And I said, "Well you don't know this, but I've done over 3,000 cases. Nobody has asked me that before." And so, I said, "I don't know if that's the case or not, but I'll go do some research for you."

I did that research, and sure enough it's well documented in the medical literature that trauma, and sometimes in some of these articles specifically, auto accident trauma can cause... I thought it would have to do with physical wrenching, but actually has more to do with internal pressure that's developed in the abdomen and pushes on the diaphragm and tears it.

And so, I was able to go back to this attorney and say, "Hey, yeah, you got a case here. Let me do some more research on this and write it up." And I was kind of thrilled because I learned something new, that physical trauma like this could actually cause these kinds of problems. And that was a damage in the case that this poor woman needed to be compensated for and get treatment for.

John: I bet even though your family and other friends know that you're maybe not practicing, I bet they still come to you with all the medical questions.

Dr. Armin Feldman: My sister-in-law flew in from Minneapolis for the annual Christmas cookie baking experience here in our house with my wife and her other sister who lives in Boulder. And she showed me, she twisted her ankle before she came. She asked me to take a look at her ankle. And I had some suggestions for her.

John: Of course, you did. Yeah. Excellent. All right, now I want to learn more about how we can learn more from you in various ways. And let's talk about the podcast for a minute. I believe that was developed really for attorneys, perhaps, but I think it can be useful to anyone who's thinking about doing this kind of work.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yes. I developed this podcast with one of my former students who is Dr. Michael Bummer in Pittsburgh. He is just going gangbusters. I'm doing medical legal consulting, and he's a smart and awfully nice guy. We teamed up and we're doing this podcast. It's called Physicians Helping Attorneys Helping People. The URL is physicianshelpingattorneys.com or any place where you listen to podcasts. But it was initially intended for attorneys so they could understand this better because like you said, it's a new field. But what I've learned is that there are a number of physicians that actually also tune in to the podcast and as you suggested, John, particularly physicians that might be interested in learning to do this kind of work.

John: Yes. The podcast, it's not been out all that long, but I had at least a dozen episodes that I listened to while I was on a recent trip. Yeah, it really helped clarify for me really what you do. And it was nice hearing the cases that you described in the podcast because it just makes it more real. If there's someone listening, and again, my audience typically are physicians thinking about various nonclinical careers or pseudo clinical careers, part-time side gigs and all that. So, this definitely fits into that. And just listening to the podcast will give you a much better understanding of what we're talking about in this short interview today.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Great.

John: Yes. But now you also have an even more direct way of helping us learn how to do this. I know you've been sort of coaching and teaching for a long time. Tell us what's new in that venue.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Right. Yes, that's right. I do have a training program, coaching program that physicians have been participating in for years. Last year I started a new online course, and this is really a crash course in how to do medical legal consulting. It's all online, do it at your own pace. And the next run of this course is coming up on January 30th, 2023.

The course is 16 videos. The course is broken into four modules of two weeks each. So, only four videos every two weeks. It's really tailored for a physician schedule. You can certainly watch four videos in two weeks. And the associated downloadable materials for each topic is there for you.

And then at the end of each two-week module, I do a live Q&A where everyone participating in the online course can save up their questions over those two weeks and I'll answer questions for an hour. The course is worth 15 category one CMEs.

John: That helps.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yeah, it does help. I'm happy to say that the first two rounds of the online course were well received. I'm happy to say the technology actually worked. No problems there. And so, I'm expecting a nice turnout for run number three starting in January.

John: Well, I can't wait because I did sign up for the course.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yes, you did.

John: If you knew that or not. But I'm going to tell my listeners, look, I'm going to put my money where my mouth is and I'm not an affiliate for this thing. I just think it's so interesting that I'm going to take the course and ask you a few questions. So, if anyone wants to join me, just let me know that you've joined and we'll be in it together.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Oh, that's just great. That's just great. When you're running an online course like that and it's on-demand videos, it's so nice to do a live Q&A because you actually get to interact with the physicians that are in the course, answer their questions and get to know who's actually taking the course.

John: Yeah, that's great. And I've got some courses online, but I'm currently not doing a live version of any of it, including a Q&A. That sounds like it's definitely a value and will help the students immensely.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yeah. In fact, one thing I say right at the beginning is when you finish this course, you will have all of the tools and all of the instructions that you need to go out and actually do this. It's not just a cursory introduction. It's, "Hey, here's how you do it."

John: Yeah. I think that people, professionals that have made a decision to change and to do some coursework or something, they really want to get into the details. They want to know "Do I have everything I needed? If I truly want to do this, I can do it." And so, I know other course creators that do the same thing, and it's always well received. So, I've got to hand it to you.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Good.

John: All right. Is there anything else you need us to know? We talked about the podcast, the course. Either any other information or just advice for us? You've talked to a lot of physicians who've done transition.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yeah. I think if you love medicine and you want to learn a lot about medicine, help people, injured people that really need this help, I don't want to sound too grandiose about this, but help the lawyers and help our legal system to some degree who are looking for some kind of nonclinical work, that you can sink your teeth into, and know that not only is it going to be helpful in terms of the income, but also helping people and something that's fun and you can enjoy, then this is something that you should consider.

John: I get a lot of people that are just early in the course of trying to find something new to do and they feel like "I've wasted my education or I'm not going to be helping people." But this is another really excellent example where "No, you are going to be using your education a lot." Reading these research papers, trying to figure out which ones really apply to this case, learning something new, because we're not all experts in every field, but we have that medical background and you're helping somebody. It's not so much that you're helping the attorney, it's the next level, which there's a patient behind that attorney that maybe has been unjustly denied certain services or treatment. Again, it's just a great thing to do and it keeps us still the mind going and using our medical skills.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yeah. Right, right. That case I mentioned earlier, her medical bill so far to date had been denied by her own insurance company. And that's why she had to hire the attorney. And now that attorney is going to help her to say, "Oh, no, no, this was accident related."

John: Excellent. Yeah. And I bet you had a real sense of accomplishment when you discovered that, in fact, that's a real thing.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yeah. Right. That's true. Yeah.

John: All right. Well, I really want to thank you again for being here, Armin. This has been fun. I'm going to get the word out to my listeners about this and we'll see what happens. But I hope all the best for the coming year with this iteration of your course, and I'm sure it gets better every year.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, John. You always ask such good questions too.

John: All right. That's because I'm really interested. So, thanks again and I'll be looking forward to seeing how things go with your course.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Great.

John: Bye-bye.

Dr. Armin Feldman: Bye.

Disclaimers:

Many of the links that I refer you to are affiliate links. That means that I receive a payment from the seller if you purchase the affiliate item using my link. Doing so has no effect on the price you are charged. And I only promote products and services that I believe are of high quality and will be useful to you.

The opinions expressed here are mine and my guest’s. While the information provided on the podcast is true and accurate to the best of my knowledge, there is no express or implied guarantee that using the methods discussed here will lead to success in your career, life, or business.

The information presented on this blog and related podcast is for entertainment and/or informational purposes only. I do not provide medical, legal, tax, or emotional advice. If you take action on the information provided on the blog or podcast, it is at your own risk. Always consult an attorney, accountant, or career counselor before making any major decisions about your career. 

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Doctors Should Explore One of These 4 Unique Nonclinical Careers – 245 https://nonclinicalphysicians.com/4-unique-nonclinical-careers/ https://nonclinicalphysicians.com/4-unique-nonclinical-careers/#respond Tue, 26 Apr 2022 11:35:47 +0000 https://nonclinicalphysicians.com/?p=9558 My Latest Discoveries In today's podcast, we review 4 unique nonclinical careers. Each is open to just about any physician with some clinical experience. And there is a specific training program available for each. That training will teach you how to prepare for and land your first job in the field.  These four [...]

The post Doctors Should Explore One of These 4 Unique Nonclinical Careers – 245 appeared first on NonClinical Physicians.

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My Latest Discoveries

In today's podcast, we review 4 unique nonclinical careers. Each is open to just about any physician with some clinical experience.

And there is a specific training program available for each. That training will teach you how to prepare for and land your first job in the field. 

These four unique nonclinical careers all share the following features:

  • they can be started part-time while still performing your current job;
  • they can all be done remotely, for the most part;
  • there are professionals who can train you.

Our Sponsor

We're proud to have the University of Tennessee Physician Executive MBA Program, offered by the Haslam College of Business, as the sponsor of this podcast.

The UT PEMBA is the longest-running, and most highly respected physician-only MBA in the country. It has over 700 graduates. And, the program only takes one year to complete. 

By joining the UT Physician Executive MBA, you will develop the business and management skills you need to find a career that you love. To find out more, contact Dr. Kate Atchley’s office at (865) 974-6526 or go to nonclinicalphysicians.com/physicianmba.


4 Unique Nonclinical Careers

1. Episode 127 with Dr. Nicole Rochester

The job title is Independent Health Advocate. It is similar to a health navigator. You will provide a variety of customized health advocacy services. You will help patients and their caregivers navigate the complicated healthcare system.

In this role, you will use your understanding of the healthcare system and clinical medicine to assist patients and their families in several ways.

  • Provide administrative support, helping patients understand what they need to do to access their insurance benefits and overcome insurance denials.
  • Translating medical jargon into understandable information about their options for care, and the indication and side effects of their medications.
  • Speak directly to physicians to help patients better understand their prognosis and treatment options.

If you’re interested, go to Dr. Rochester's website at yourgpsdoc.com and navigate to her contact page.

2. Episode 134 with Dr. Shirag Shemmassian

Shemmassian Academic Consulting reviews and edits essays, and advises clients on curricula to pursue. The goal is to optimize the chances of admission to a top-ranked university, medical school, or residency program.

To best qualify for this unique job you must demonstrate:

  • Intimate knowledge of the admissions process (admissions committee experience is a plus);
  • Excellent written and communication skills;
  • Exceptional patience, empathy, and warmth;
  • A degree from a top-25 university;
  • Current or past enrollment in a prestigious residency or fellowship program;
  • Completion of Shemmassian’s evaluative interview process and training.

To find out more, go to www.shemmassianconsulting.com/join-our-team, or send an email to jobs@shemmassianconsulting.com.

3. Episode 227 with Dr. Armin Feldman

Dr. Feldman offers training as a Medical Legal Consultant. The consulting is pre-litigation and pre-trial in nature. The consultant helps attorneys manage the medical aspects of cases, increase case value and save attorneys' time. This helps attorneys to negotiate and settle cases and get the appropriate medical care for their clients. This job does not require participation in medical malpractice cases.

The work mostly involves personal injury and worker's compensation cases. 

Dr. Feldman has created a comprehensive coaching program for physicians interested in learning how to do this work. You can watch a short video by Armin and learn more at mdbizcon.com.

Episode 238 with Dr. Paul Hercock

Mantra Systems employs physician consultants with European Union MDR expertise to do a variety of duties for its client medical device companies. The entry-level position is called Medical Affairs Associate.

Those services include things like:
•  Clinical Evaluation Report-writing services.
•  Regulatory Medical Writing services designed for EU MDR compliance.

The easiest way to find out about the EU MDR and the Medical Affairs Associates Program is to use this link: nonclinicalphysicians.com/mantra

Summary of 4 Unique Nonclinical Careers

In this episode, John presents four unique nonclinical careers that most medical school graduates can consider. Some also require at least a few years of clinical experience. They can be started part-time, and grown to full-time. And most can be done remotely on your own schedule.

NOTE: Look below for a transcript of today's episode.


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Transcription PNC Podcast Episode 245

Doctors Should Explore One of These 4 Unique Nonclinical Careers

John: You're listening to Physician Nonclinical Careers with John Jurica, the podcast that inspires, encourages and teaches physicians how to pivot to a new career. I'm here to help you pursue a career that brings you joy and harnesses your zone of genius.

Episode number 245 - Doctors should explore one of these four unique nonclinical careers. If this is your first time listening, well, then welcome aboard. Every week I bring you an interview or a solo presentation to help you find a part-time side gig or land an alternate full-time job. If you like what you hear, share this podcast with a frustrated friend or colleague. For those who've been with us before, let me ask you this. Have you written a review of the podcast? No? Then please do me a favor. Scroll down on your smartphone when you're in the podcast app and leave a rating and a review. I'll really appreciate that. And it helps to keep us going.

For today's presentation, it's just me reviewing the specifics of four unique nonclinical jobs that I have encountered during the past few years. Some of you I know aren't looking for a traditional nonclinical career in a sense in hospital management, pharma, medical writing, consulting, or utilization management. Those are the big industries that typically employ physicians nonclinically. But if that's you and you don't want to do one of those, I think you'll find all of these very intriguing jobs, something to consider. The other reason that I single these out is because there are specific training programs available for each that will teach you how to prepare for and land your first job in the field.

Now, before we get to the interview, if you want to connect with me and hundreds of other colleagues, developing alternative careers, the best thing you can do is join us in Newscript where you can write a new script for your career and your life. It's an online forum and repository of interviews, written resources, courses, and livestream events, all in one place, right there in your smartphone. It's private, uncensored and free with a growing panel of expert mentors.

You get it at a monthly subscription cost. That's less than a single cup of coffee and a donut for an entire month, still under $5 per month as of me recording this today. Now, if you listen to this down the road in a few months or a year, it probably will be at a higher price because as the community grows, the cost of becoming a member will increase. In the meantime, just go to newscript.app to join hundreds of clinicians writing a new script for their lives.

Now it's time to thank our wonderful sponsor. An MBA can be very helpful for certain nonclinical careers, and for those already in practice, an executive MBA is probably the best option. Our show sponsor, the University of Tennessee, offers the longest running and most highly respected physician only executive MBA in the country. In fact, it has produced more than 700 graduates and for some career pivots, you really need that MBA. The ASM college of business at UT was recently ranked number one in the world by Economist magazine as the most relevant executive MBA program.

And it's efficient, unlike most other programs, which run about two years in length, the UT PEMBA only takes one year to complete. And while you're there, you'll complete a company project while working on the MBA, which will help you to demonstrate the value of the degree while you're still in the program.

Graduates have taken leadership positions at major healthcare organizations and have become entrepreneurs and business owners. If you want to acquire new business and management skills and advance your nonclinical career, then contact Dr. Kate Atchley's office at (865) 974-6526 or use our link at nonclinicalphysicians.com/physicianmba.

Nonclinical nation, as I mentioned, I want to review today four unique nonclinical careers that all share the following features. That can be started part-time while still performing your current job, that can all be done remotely for the most part. And there are professionals who are doing the job who will teach you how to do the job as well.

The first job was discussed way back in episode 127 with my guest Dr. Nicole Rochester. Dr. Rochester is the founder and CEO of Your GPS Doc, LLC. A health advocacy company whose mission is to educate and empower patients and family caregivers so they can navigate the healthcare system.

Nicole was inspired to launch her company after caring for her late father. She uses her inside knowledge of the healthcare system to advocate for her clients, thereby overcoming the barriers that interfere with timely effective patient-centered medical care.

Nicole is a nationally recognized speaker, best-selling author and media expert. When I first spoke with Nicole and I heard what she was doing, I really became intrigued and thought that this could be a very fulfilling career for other physicians because we like to help patients and we're to trying to get away from the clinical mess that we're in sometimes with the electronic medical records and other aspects of modern medical practice. And by being a healthcare navigator or advocate, you definitely can be helping patients.

She calls this position that of an independent health advocate. It's similar to a health navigator that some hospitals employ, kind of similar to a case manager in a way, except that case managers are either working for a system or working for an insurance company. But as an independent health advocate, you are working for the patient and the patient's family generally. In doing so, you will provide a variety of customized health advocacy services to help the patients and their families and help them navigate the complicated healthcare system, of course, that they find themselves in, in the United States.

In this role, you will use your understanding of the healthcare system and of clinical medicine to assist patients in several ways. Let me list a few of them. You might provide administrative support, helping patients understand that they need to access their insurance benefits and overcome insurance denials in certain ways. Those are the things we come into contact with constantly while taking care of patients. You'll be translating medical jargon into understandable information about their options for care and indications and side effects or their medications.

For families and patients who are faced with a really serious illness or an uncommon illness, patients can use you to speak directly to their physicians and review their medical records and help them better understand their prognosis and treatment options. These are things that really a physician would be best at, even other professionals in the medical field can't really understand the nuances of the discussions to the extent that a physician would.

In this role, you're paid to integrate the information for patients with serious illnesses, so they can make more informed decisions about their care and have a clearer understanding of the consequences of their illness and its treatment. To do this job, you may need to attend medical appointments in person, but often it can be done virtually. You can do things like compare assisted living, rehabilitation, long term care, nursing home facilities, and home care agencies, and then provide your advice to the clients about which would be the best for you.

Basically, you'd be using your medical background in education to research treatment options and alternatives, especially in those various serious illnesses. The work can be very rewarding. And as I noted a minute ago, it's mostly done remotely. Generally, in this kind of business like the others discuss today, you're going to be serving as an independent contractor and small business owner. The overhead is negligible. You're paid as a consultant, usually at an hourly rate.

Now, when I last spoke with Nicole, she was mentoring and teaching other physicians to become independent health advocates. If you're interested in learning more about how to do this, the quickest way is to contact her directly. You can go to her website at yourgpsdoc.com and then navigate to her contact page and send her a note. You could probably also reach out to her on LinkedIn.

Now, the second unique job I want to present today was described to me by my guest, Dr. Shirag Shemmassian. Now in episode 134, I learned that there's a growing need for young physicians to serve as part-time consultants and advisors to high school and college students and med students really, as they prepare to compete rather for positions in universities and medical schools and residencies.

Shirag is not a medical doctor. He's actually a psychologist who completed his undergraduate work at Cornell and masters in PhD at UCLA. And he wasn't sure what he was going to get into. But about 20 years ago, he began doing some part-time coaching and advising students to help them with admissions to universities and professional schools. And he kept having more, more people ask him to help with those kinds of activities. So that in 2013, he formally opened the Shemmassian Academic Consulting company, which now employs dozens of academic consultants and assists hundreds of students each year.

What do these consultants do? Well, just like he was doing, they provide remote coaching and mentoring of students who are preparing to apply to universities, medical schools and residencies. And in that role, they review and edit essays. They advise clients on courses and curricula to pursue, to optimize their chances for admission. And usually, they're focusing on admission to the top tier schools.

To best qualify for this unique job, you must have an intimate knowledge of the admissions process. If you have experience on an admissions committee, that'd be a great plus. You have to have excellent writing and communication skills. You have to have exceptional patience, empathy, and warmth. You should hold degrees from a top 25 university or a top medical school. You should be currently enrolled or completed a highly ranked residency or fellowship program. And then to get going, you have to complete the Shemmassian's evaluative interview process and the training they provide.

This is the first time I've ever talked to an academic consulting type position, someone doing that and also teaching it. I found it very interesting and this probably is not open to those who are more than just a few years out of their residency or fellowship. But if you've been involved in academic institutions and teaching, if you've been on an academic review committee, then it's really something worth thinking about and Shemmassian's company will help prep you for this and teach you how to do it.

And then of course has jobs right there for you to pursue. You can learn more about this at the website www.shemmassianconsulting.com. If you add the suffix join-our-team, that's the tab that'll take you actually to the contact form to get in touch with them. Shemmassian is spelled with two M's and two S's. It's www.shemmassianconsulting.com and you will find out how to learn more about that job.

The third of our unique positions is that of medical legal consultant. I was introduced to this work by Dr. Armin Feldman in episode 227 of this podcast. Armin completed his training in psychiatry at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center. And he practiced psychiatry and psychoanalysis for over 20 years.

But he began doing a unique kind of medical old legal consulting about 20 years ago. And for about 14 years, he devoted himself professionally entirely to this type of service full time. And then 12 years ago, he began training other physicians how to do the same thing that he was doing through his medical legal consulting coaching program. And it is different from medical expert witness consulting.

To be a medical expert witness, you should really still be in practice and you will provide three primary services. You'll be doing chart reviews, depositions, and courtroom testimony if you're an expert witness. But Dr. Feldman's consulting is pre-lit litigation and pre-trial in nature. So, he's helping attorneys manage the medical aspect of cases, increasing case value and saving attorney time. In other words, he's using his medical expertise to kind of show the attorneys the pros and cons in this case, should it be pursued, should it not be pursued? He's helping attorneys negotiate and settle cases and get the appropriate medical care for their clients, but he doesn't participate in medical malpractice cases.

He's not really doing expert witness work. He does not do depositions and he doesn't do any sort of testimony at trials. Part of the reason is the work mostly involves personal injury and workers' compensation cases. And really what you're doing is you're reviewing available information, medical records and the history of the cases and so forth. And you're doing research on the actual injury or illness that has occurred and using that information to educate the attorneys who then have to decide how they're going to approach that case. And so, unlike expert witness consulting, you don't have to be an active practice or even have an active license.

And the other thing is that Dr. Feldman is a psychiatrist. He really doesn't have extensive knowledge in orthopedics or occupational medicine or that kind of thing. But everything that he has learned in order to provide the expertise for the attorneys that he needs to provide them just comes from research and his medical background, 90% of which just came through medical school from what he tells me.

Similar to these other jobs, he works as an independent consultant, probably forming an LLC to do that. Set your own hours and you work remotely. And it's really not limited to any specialty. It can be started part-time and grown and like medical expert witness consulting, it pays better than the other positions I'm describing in today's episode.

Now, as I said, Dr. Feldman created a comprehensive coaching program several years back, and he's actually had over a thousand physicians go through it. Using his course, you can learn how to do this work and grow your consulting business. And so, it sounds pretty intriguing to me. You can learn more by watching a short video by Armin and learn more about it at mdbizcon.com.

Well, this brings me to the fourth and final unique job I want to present today. It was described by Dr. Paul Hercock in episode 238 of the podcast. Actually, he was on my podcast twice, and number 238 was his most recent visit. He's an author, entrepreneur and an educator. Actually, the first time we talked to him, we talked about his book.

But he started personally serving medical device companies several years ago. And this kind of grew out of the recent adoption of the MDR regulations in the European Union. And since they've adapted these new sets of rules and regulations, the need for more physicians to serve in a variety of roles to help medical device companies comply with them has grown tremendously. Paul runs a company called Mantra Systems that employs physicians like this, who are consultants with EU MDR expertise to do a variety of duties for its client medical device companies. And the entry level position that we mostly spoke about was called the medical affairs associate.

Now these medical affairs associates do things like the following for their clients. They do the actual clinical evaluation and clinical evaluation report writing, in which they do extensive data analysis and they use their medical writing expertise. They also do regulatory medical writing services, again, that are designed to meet the MDR regulations. Again, with this new adoption, the demand for these experts has been so high that he ended up developing his own program to train physicians to provide those services. At first it was limited, but he has created an extensive set of courses or lessons within his program to train physicians how to help companies such as medical device companies and contract research organizations meet the MDR requirements.

And like the other three jobs described today, it's a remote part-time position that can ultimately become full-time if desired. It pays well, and really is actually open to physicians in the US as well as the UK. And there are several other international locations where these same regulations apply or where the medical device companies have headquarters or locations where you could do this.

So, you can complete your training and apply for a position with Mantra Systems itself or with other medical device companies or contract research organizations that support the medical device companies. The easiest way to find out about the EU MDR and the medical affairs associates' program is to use this link that I created nonclinicalphysicians.com/mantra. I made that back when I was talking with Paul.

Let me wrap up now. These are four pretty unique and interesting nonclinical careers and jobs that I wanted to present. They can all be started part-time and performed remotely. They're all open to physicians from almost any specialty. The other thing I wanted to mention is I'm not an affiliate for any of these training programs, so I don't have any financial relationship. I will say that Mantra was a sponsor for two episodes of my podcast. But other than that, we have no ongoing relationship. I just think these are unique, interesting, and potentially well-paying part-time jobs that can be done remotely that physicians should take a look at. Now, all the links that I mentioned today and a transcript of this episode can be found at nonclinicalphysicians.com/uniquenonclinicalcareers.

Let's see, before we close, let me remind you about Newscript. It's a community of clinicians writing a new script for their careers. We're still accepting new members, of course, and the membership is very low cost. There's really a lot of free content in there once you're a member. There are live streams I'm doing weekly and they're recorded. So, there's probably at least 20 of those. They're all about nonclinical and non-traditional careers and some business topics, management and leadership.

Tom posts all the time. We have now about eight mentors covering things like locum tenens, an expert in SEO who's a dentist, I believe. Mark Leads is his name. We have pharma experts. We have book authors. There's a lot in there already, and it's going to continue to grow. So, it's really foolish not to check it out at newscript.app and consider joining now before the cost jumps up. Once you've locked in your payment level, you can keep that forever.

Remember that the podcast is made possible by support of my nice, wonderful, ongoing long-term sponsor, the University of Tennessee Physician Executive MBA program. If you're seriously thinking about going for an executive MBA, you definitely should check out the UT at nonclinicalphysicians.com/physicianmba. I'll remind you that I do use affiliate links from time to time, which I receive a payment from the seller, but there shouldn't be any in today's episode, or on the blog or website.

The opinions expressed today are just mine while the information provided in the podcast is true and accurate to the best of my knowledge. There's no guarantee that using the methods discussed will lead to success in your career, life or business. Always consult an attorney, accountant or career counselor or strategist before making any major decision about your career.

Now, usually at this point, at least recently, I've been trying to give you a teaser about what the upcoming episode will be. I'm in a weird situation now because I'm moving from where I've lived with my wife for the last 20 plus years into a new home. So, we are in the middle of packing everything up, and I'm falling behind a little bit on my episodes here, but I have some very interesting guests coming up in the next few weeks.

I just don't know who's going to be up next week because I haven't recorded it yet, but I hope to be interviewing Dr. Lynn Marie Morski who's been on here before. But since we spoke with her, she has become the founder and president of the Psychedelic Medical Association. And I want to learn about how different kinds of what used to be totally avoided medication and controlled and so forth, which they still are, but how some of these psychedelics and cannabinoids and ketamine and other things are being used in new ways for PTSD and depression and other things. So, she'll be coming on the podcast soon.

I'm talking to a physician and she'll be on the podcast who is running basically a nonclinical career website with all kinds of free resources, but she's in the UK. So, doing a lot in the nonclinical career area and I just discovered her in the past month or so. So, she'll be coming on the podcast. And then there's another, again, international physician who teaches health wellness in yoga instruction. I think she was a family physician and she'll be coming on. I've got some interesting episodes coming up and I don't want to belabor that anymore. I really thank you for listening here to the very end and I will see you next week. Bye-bye.

Disclaimers:

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The opinions expressed here are mine and my guest’s. While the information provided on the podcast is true and accurate to the best of my knowledge, there is no express or implied guarantee that using the methods discussed here will lead to success in your career, life, or business.

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