DNP Unscripted 011: Meet Dr. Annie DePasquale, MD who helps NPs find a Collaborating Physician

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Dr. Nurse podcast fam. Welcome to another episode of the doctor’s podcast. So happy to have on Dr. Annie on the podcast today. She’s going to come on and talk about what she’s into, what she’s built for herself as a doctor, as an actual MD entrepreneur. So she graduated from the university of Richmond with her medical degree, Richmond, Virginia,

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: she completed her residency at Georgetown, the prestigious. Georgetown University in Washington, DC. And she founded Collaborating Docs in 2020 as a board certified family medicine physician who saw firsthand the need that NPs had for getting with a supervising physician to practice independently. So she realized it was so hard that she had to do something about it.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: She actually fell in love with NPs during her mentorship as a physician and was just like, this should not be so hard for them. I’m going to create. Something to solve that problem. So her mission is to make it easy for NPs to have freedom of choice in their careers, which is something very close to the Dr.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Nurse podcast heart that just options for NPs. So collaborating docs, her company has. Helped match 1500 NPs with collaborating physicians. And she loves to spend time with her four babies in her free time, which again, another thing close to the doctor nurse podcast is moms. And I just want to say welcome Annie to the podcast.

Dr. Annie: Thank you so much for having me. I’m really excited to be here and I love what you do. So this is, this is a treat for me. Thank you. Thank you

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: so much. So let’s go ahead and again, I’ve summarized what it is that you do, but you tell my audience kind of how you see yourself in your, your day to day roles.

Dr. Annie: Sure. Yeah. Thank you. Thanks for that intro. I, I’m a busy mom with four little children that, you know, they’re my pride and joy of all right. A one year old, four year old, five year old and eight year old now. So they keep us very, very, very busy. So kids are kids are number one, but you know, after kid and family life career stuff.

Dr. Annie: Yes. I, I am a family doc. And. Okay. Proud to be the founder, kind of the pioneer of a matchmaking service that helps nurse practitioners connect with awesome collaborating physicians. It, it was quite apparent just from my own experience, helping a couple of nurse practitioners that I knew on the side of my practice for almost five years.

Dr. Annie: I was just helping a couple of people and love doing it, love teaching, love mentoring, but sort of became. obvious talking to them, getting to know them and some of their colleagues. Like it is really hard out there to find nice, normal physicians who want to help. I hate to say, but yeah, that simple criteria is hard to find.

Dr. Annie: So it, it sort of, I’d say the business concept sort of fell in my lap, just helping people and then. Honestly, just loads of nurse practitioners started asking me to help them so many I couldn’t possibly help everyone myself. So I thought, well, I could, I could connect with my friend or my colleague and then, you know, that’s sort of how this took off.

Dr. Annie: And yeah, we’re proud to have helped a whole lot of people in the last 3 years. So it’s been, it’s. It’s, you know, really gets me jumping out of bed in the morning to help a lot of nurse practitioners make this happen.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: So is this what you do primarily now? Do you practice as well or is this all that you do?

Dr. Annie: I was juggling both for the first year and a half. So about a year and a half, we’re three years in. So about a year and a half ago, I was able to finally step away. Thank the Lord, because yeah, totally burnout, primary care, you know, burnout was affecting me hardcore. So but more so I was juggling an 80 hour, a week sort of, you know, startup on top of seeing patients.

Dr. Annie: 20 to 40 hours. So, you know, the time it was, it was very challenging. So it is nice to fully focus on one thing.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Yeah. Yeah. A hundred percent. And not only that, but you, you didn’t even include in those 80 hours of working both of those jobs, mothering in between, which is, you know, as you said, your pride and joy, the number one thing you can do.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: And so a lot of the things that I tell my listeners. Is pay attention where you’re working. Be present where you’re working. Notice what keeps finding you and maybe you can create something from that, that could actually set you free from the drudgery of the nine to five or eight to seven or whatever it is, the non, miss.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Stop family medicine work that a lot of nurse practitioners are family medicine, you know, trained nurse practitioners. And so I think that it’s incredible that you were able to kind of find a need, find a hole and then move to fill the hole and be able to create something that now you can do your most important work and do this on the side to build something up for yourself that you can.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Create a great service to help nurse practitioners make their jobs easier as they try to go and do something and build something for themselves. So I think that’s just, ah, it’s full circle, Oprah. And I love it. I absolutely love it. So, okay. So tell, tell our, my listeners kind of how you work. What is it that you do you find these doctors?

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: What’s the criteria for the docs that you’re like, okay, this is not a crazy doctor that’s going to be taking advantage of the nurse practitioner. This is the requirement. And then this is how we match up our nurse practitioners with these docs.

Dr. Annie: Yeah, sure. We, we, we are seeking out the, the nice and normal doctors of the world.

Dr. Annie: They, they are out there. Sometimes they’re hard to find. I can say as 1 of the crazy bunch out there, but. Yeah, our criteria is number one, they must be very pro NP, very supportive. Cause we all know there’s, I mean, there are haters out there, right? I mean, it’s sort of a well known thing that doctor and NP relations are not always the world’s best.

Dr. Annie: I don’t really understand that personally, but, but it exists. So, so we’re very cautious to only deal and talk with physicians that are in it for the right reasons. And ideally ones who love. To teach and mentor. So a lot of them are tied to universities or colleges or training programs. A lot of our physicians have their own practice or have had their own practice, so they can also relate like, very well.

Dr. Annie: And I think they’re more of an asset to our clients. But, yeah, it started, it was very challenging at the beginning, finding a good stable of physicians. In every single state in every single specialty, right? It’s, it’s a lot to cover. So, so that was hard. I spent a lot of time blowing up the phone cold calling.

Dr. Annie: I mean, all sorts of things. But, but then once we found people, we would closely vet them and get to know them and make sure it was going to be a good fit. Obviously look into their backgrounds. Now it’s become easier a couple of years in now, a lot of physicians actually seek us out and they say, Oh, I want to do that.

Dr. Annie: You know, how do I do this? I, you know, sign me up for this. And then, you know, we still take a very close look at who, who this person is. But we also, we’re very cautious. We’ll give a doc, a new doc, maybe 1. Client and check in, how’s it going? Are they responsive? Are they doing the things they need to do before we load someone up with, you know, 5 people?

Dr. Annie: So we’re just, we take it very slow and steady. I would say, So yeah, that’s kind of the doctor side. I feel like what was the second half of your question? It was

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: related. And then, and then the nurse practitioners. So like, how do they get linked with the docs? Like, how do you pull them together?

Dr. Annie: Yeah. So that side really proud to say we employ, currently we have seven full time nurse practitioners on our staff. Yay. So they are our onboarding team. So if you’re interested in working with us, you’re going to talk to a nurse practitioner. Who is fully employed by us. And most of them have had their own practice or at least a very, you know, a clear background in collaboration themselves.

Dr. Annie: So they, they get what’s needed and what our clients are looking for. So we’ll have a nice, meaningful conversation. Usually we try to do it over zoom. And then build that relationship, you know, really it’s true matchmaking. It’s not a computer algorithm or AI or something like. spewing out matches. It’s, we get to know our prospective client, the nurse practitioner and we know our doctors and then we really put them together.

Dr. Annie: A separate team is our matchmaking team and they actually take all the info about both parties and find the right match. Cause it could be like people are all very different, right? I want a doc that’s a recent grad that knows everything about everything and is you know, just really sharp or. I’d rather a retired doc who has all the time in the world so I can call him every day and talk for an hour.

Dr. Annie: You know, people have different needs and we can usually now we have a big stable, I think about 1500 doctors. So, you know, we, we can find the right fit for everybody. Which is nice. So

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: cool. And doctors all over the country. Right? So you’ve got them in all the States. So for a nurse that’s tuned in, she’s like, wait, wait, okay.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: What’s going on? Why do I need a collaborating physician? What’s happening? I didn’t even know I need, what is this? What, what are we doing? So I was thinking about, as you were talking, the nurse that’s like, wait, what the nurse practitioner is like, I don’t even know anything this is about. Why do you need a collaborating physician?

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Kind of what kind of set the stage for how then they would go out and go. Oh, wait, and then there’s this great company that I don’t even have to work hard for this. So let’s maybe set the stage for, yeah, I want to do that. Like right now.

Dr. Annie: What is this all about? Yeah, it is. It is a legal requirement in about half of the country, largely in the South, some Midwest.

Dr. Annie: California is sort of, it’s more like a smiley face across the bottom of the country. Pretty much. States require, if you’re going to do your own practice of some sort, any sort, I want to have my own Botox clinic, I want to do tele psych, like, whatever it might be your state dictates what you can do and how, so it’s sort of A requirement that you have someone in the wings there to support you for clinical advising.

Dr. Annie: So certain states require a certain number of chart reviews, certain number of meetings, a certain number of conversations. And we are very cautious about what those regulations are and make sure that happens. But basically, it’s. Shockingly difficult to find a physician you know, really familiar with this and really excited to do it.

Dr. Annie: Doctors are very risk averse. So just like, wait, what? I’m helping someone and I’m not there. Like, how’s this going to work? So, we’ve done the educating on our end to find doctors who are, you know, they understand this model and the role they play to be like a support sounding board sort of so yeah, you’d have to look at your own state sort of guidance if, if you need this or not.

Dr. Annie: I do think with time, it won’t be needed anywhere. Hopefully that’s even our hope. I’m ready to retire. And, you know, when the time comes, it’s fine. Totally fine. So we’re helping while it’s needed when it’s not needed. All the better, like it every year, a state or two kind of flips and becomes fully independent, like Kansas last year.

Dr. Annie: So it’s kind of ticking, ticking down the states, which is good

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: by that time. And you will have figured something out and the skills that you will have learned from this will make you so you’ll be able to go do something else just even as marvelous and wonderful. So that I think is. Down the road, but even if it is, I think you’re going to be just fine with your with your new set of skills that you learned as a physician.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: But I think what I find again, kind of recapping what you’re saying, this is for the nurse practitioner that is wanting to open up her own business and is living in 1 of those settings. Smiley face or maybe frowny face states that is not allowed, does not allow nurse practitioners to practice completely independently.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: And you’ve got to have a collaborating physician to supervise your work, somebody that you can. Reach out to if something goes wrong or you need someone to kind of come in and just kind of supervise what it is that you’re doing. And again, like you said, there’s a need there and you’re filling the need.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: So I think that’s really, really cool. And I think that, again, like you said, you’re solving that problem that can be really burdensome to nurse practitioners because what were you seeing that made you go, Oh, this is a problem. What were you noticing?

Dr. Annie: There’s so many problems. I’ll say it seems like the main place nurse practitioners look is on indeed.

Dr. Annie: com. Like, I mean, that’s what I heard from people. And I was sort of looking on indeed and seeing, I mean, it’s even where I found some of my own clients, like as a nurse practitioner, you can go on sometimes even free, like to post an ad, like I’m looking for a collaborator in Virginia, I’m doing primary care and then physicians apply, but.

Dr. Annie: From what I learned, physicians prey on the nurse practitioners on there and they’ll say, Oh, yeah, I’ll help you for a percentage of your profit, or I will do it for 5, 000 a month, or like some insanely crazy amount of money that is not fair at all. And, and a lot of those physicians, I was hearing from other nurse practitioners, like, I’m paying a ton of money to this doctor who never calls me back, who never answers my questions, who never does the chart review, like, so they’re even charging a ton and not even delivering anything, so it’s like, it’s abominable.

Dr. Annie: I mean, really, that’s what got me very fired up, like, this, Has to be stopped. Like that should that’s so slimy and horrible. Obviously this is I’m talking in extremes. Of course, there’s some nice doctors out there, but it is a vast majority. I would say do that. I just talked to someone the other day and she said.

Dr. Annie: What was it, the physician that she posts on Indeed and she got, she said these were like the craziest people I ever met in my life. One doctor said, I’ll help you if you prescribe narcotics to me. This is a true story from the other day. I’m like, holy smokes. So. There’s a lot of weirdness out there.

Dr. Annie: That’s why.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Wow.

Dr. Annie: Yeah. Really sketchy. Super

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: sketchy. That is super sketch. Wow. Somebody should report that guy. I don’t know what that is, but hit report by

Dr. Annie: now. Yes. Not cool. Not cool. Wow.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: So that’s what you were noticing out in the world that you were like, it’s time. Got to step in. Someone’s got to do something because this is a mess.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: So then what specialties do you guys provide? Like, what specialties do you guys go into to create those, those partnerships between docs and NPs?

Dr. Annie: We’re very open. I mean, we take all comers. We’ve actually had some really crazy requests from people. I’m trying to think of like, one of the crazier requests.

Dr. Annie: But people who get very niche, like, we’ll help anybody. So, I mean, we’ve had, you know, wound care is not that niche, but we’ve had anything from primary care to urgent care, aesthetics, IV hydration. Definitely like mental health, like PMH and P’s going into psychiatry and, but also some very unusual niche, you know, well, oh, yesterday came across my desk was we need a physician trained in hyperbaric medicine.

Dr. Annie: Oh, my gosh. I don’t think I’ve ever met someone trained in that my whole life, but. We’ll try. We’ll find them for you. So yeah, we get all kinds of things. And again, we, we’ve yet to be stumped. Not saying it’s not hard sometimes. We sent out, you know, the bat signal and we’re like trying to find the right person, but we have never, ever been stumped with the weird.

Dr. Annie: Requests, not written weird requests, but

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: yeah, yeah, yeah. If you got it, we’ll try to find it. That’s really neat. So what is the process that an NP goes through in order to get connected with you guys? So she’s working in, you know, psych mental health. She has like a telehealth business. She might want to do functional medicine and she needs kind of a, you know, supervising physician for that.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: What’s the process look like? What does she do? Where does she go? How does it get started? How much does it cost?

Man, I hate to stop a great conversation, but I have to tell you guys about what’s going on at SuccessandPeace. com.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: It’s Jackie and I’s newly launched SuccessNP website that has access to all of our clinical booklets. We were able to create a fabulous resource for nurse practitioner and nurse practitioner students to use during their clinical rotations. What we noticed was that there was something missing that nurse practitioner students would go to clinicals and by the time that they would finally get up and running,

The clinical rotation would be over.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: So what we thought was, could we create a shortcut? Could we create a hack that would help them? Get the most out of their clinical experience. My best friend Jackie and I created these booklets, and we have gotten five star rave reviews from so many nurse practitioner and nurse practitioner students that have been using our booklets and feel like it’s made a difference in their clinical journey.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: So I invite you to click the link in the show notes, check it out, see what other things we have at our shop. We’ve got really cute nurse practitioner gear. We have some digital planners. We’ve got a lot of great resources to help you beautify your nursing journey. There’s just not a lot of stuff for nurse practitioners and we want to feel special too. So check out our shop. See if there’s anything there that you might like. Again, Any support that you throw towards the shop is support that you put towards the podcast.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: So guys, thanks for listening. Thanks for hanging out with me. I hope you’re enjoying the conversation and, let’s get back to it.

Dr. Annie: Sure. Yeah. We like to start with just that simple conversation, usually over video chat, ideally, or phone if people prefer that, but we It can be booked right through our website. So an NP comes on, books a call, day and time works for them.

Dr. Annie: They talk to one of our nurse practitioner team members about what they’re doing or trying to do, their practice, their own experience, like what they want out of their physician, any special requirements. So they have that conversation. On that call, we provide a personalized quote. They are personalized.

Dr. Annie: We do not have a price list. We do not have a lot of people say, why isn’t that on your website? How much it costs. The reason is everyone is given a quote by their nurse practitioner. They’re talking to based on what they’re offering because there’s so many factors, like no price sheet would do it justice.

Dr. Annie: Like is it super basic telemed one day a week versus I’m injecting Botox 12 hours a day, five days a week. You know, it’s. Difference of liability difference of like, how much effort the physician is going to have to put in. So we have to take into account. Things like that. Also, location. So, certain states have a lot more stringent regulations around collaborating.

Dr. Annie: Like in Georgia, you need a on site visit every quarter. Tennessee has an on site requirement. So, if a physician has to get in their car and drive to your office and sit down and check things out, you know, it takes time and effort. So, we take into account all these things even experience of the NP, you know, if you’ve done it 20 years.

Dr. Annie: probably not going to need much help, right? It’s more of like a silly legal thing at that point versus I just graduated yesterday. I’m going to probably need a good bit of help on things. So we factored in, but average, like we start at 600 a month for like basic stuff, like basic telemed and things like that.

Dr. Annie: If there’s a brick and mortar component, it kind of creeps up to about 750 ish. And then there’s some add ons if you’re doing aesthetics or other like procedural things, tons of pain meds, like something a little out there, it’s going to creep up past that. But we really are trying to keep it like in that affordable range below what all these awful, awful people on Indeed are doing like way below that.

Dr. Annie: So it’s like, okay, this is just a line item on my budget. It’s. Part of doing business, but it’s not going to break the bank by any means it’s it’s like a you feel like you’re getting worth for that. You know, you’re getting value for what you’re paying for it. So that amount

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: include what goes to the collaborating doc.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: So, like, so that amount is included in. All right, I pay for the service, but then this also pays for the doctor. So they take care of it. They make sure that the requirements that are needed for the state that. They’re getting those things done. The doc has the scheduling. So all this stuff is worked through your company, which actually would take a huge level of stress off the NP just to know that as long as I’m making this payment every month, part of my business, I’ve got that part taken care of from a legal aspect.

Dr. Annie: Yeah, that it can get really, really expensive because if you go high, you’d have to go hire your own lawyer. Of course, to draft a collaborative agreement. I saw that you do that. Yeah. A lot of lawyers don’t even know what that is. Like, they don’t even know what collaborating is not that well known out in the real world.

Dr. Annie: So if they don’t have other medical clients, they’re probably have no idea what you’re talking about. So that’s, Time money for them to figure it out. So we, we provide the agreement. We provide a state guidance and we always keep up with it because it changes a ton. So quite often and we cover the physician’s malpractice, which I think we’re super proud.

Dr. Annie: It was very hard to get a plan to cover. Hundreds of doctors at once, you know, it was, it costs us a pretty penny and it’s hard to even just get it going, but we’ve had it over two years now. And it’s so nice. Like that usually falls on the NP, right? So like, if it’s your practice, you got to pay for the malpractice for the doc helping you, but this way you don’t like we, we cover it and it’s in that same, you know, monthly fee.

Dr. Annie: So it’s. You do get a lot for the money. It’s not just the dock itself. There’s more, I’d say, to it. We do charge, I just want to be clear for people listening, we do charge a one time onboarding fee of 500. So that’s where we, you know, cover our expense of like frantically calling every doctor we know to find the one that does hyperbaric medicine.

Dr. Annie: And set things up properly, but beyond that, the, the money mostly honestly goes to the doctor or kind of like a pass through to the doc. Primarily.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Gotcha. That’s so cool. And what if now, again, this is just a hypothetical. What if you match up an N. P. And she’s like, can’t stand him or he’s, or the, or the male nurse practitioners like can’t stand her.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: I just don’t like her. I want out. What then Annie? What do you do, Doc Annie? We,

Dr. Annie: we definitely rematch. We’re very, we have a great client success team who is now led by an NP. So, like, weirdos, NP’s everywhere, so you’ll talk to an NP about the problem. And yes, if the doc is a grouch, or not nice, or whatever, I’ll tell you two things will happen.

Dr. Annie: One, we’ll get you a new match, free. But two… We’re probably gonna cut ties with that doctor. I mean, if he rubs you wrong, he’s probably gonna rub a lot of other people wrong. So I have a very short fuse. I chop quickly. Any word of bad behavior or something along those lines, we just don’t put up with it because we need to have a good staple.

Dr. Annie: It’s our brand on the line. We don’t want anyone saying, Oh yeah, they’ll give you a doc who’s horrible like they did to me. Like it’s, it’s few and far between because we do our vetting ahead, but if someone slips through, at least we end it then and nobody else is affected. So, yeah. Yeah, that’s how we handle it.

Dr. Annie: Yeah. One thing

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: I was thinking about while you were talking, I was thinking, okay, so what if there’s a new nurse practitioner? That’s thinking, okay, I don’t really know what to do. I don’t even know what kind of doctor I want. So, like, these, you know, seasoned nurse practitioners that have been in business a long time.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: They’re like, I want this. I want that. I want that. They know how to order right off the menu, right? They know how to pick what they want, but for a new nurse, it’s like, is there a combo meal? Like, I have no idea what I even want. want, you know, what do you guys help them through that process? Cause there might be a new nurse practitioner that’s like, okay, I’m kind of scared.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: I think I can maybe start something, but I don’t even know what I need or want. Is there a process in which you guys help that nurse practitioner? Do you have like a system in place to kind of go like, you’re going to want these things. If you’re starting off

Dr. Annie: exactly, and that’s why we hire exclusively nurse practitioners to talk through this whole process.

Dr. Annie: Because, yeah, they know, and they’ll kind of guide the client through that, like, with probing questions, like, you know, what is your comfort with, like, what you’re going into? Or do you feel like you’re going to have a lot of questions or, you know, they kind of pull it out of them just, Yeah, so we’re all

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: good.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Yeah. Okay. And then that’s why that cost might be higher and because you’re going to need kind of more close handholding. And then can they always. Like, reassess their, their contract later and go, like, listen, I’m more independent now. I’m better. I think I need less, you know, can they reassess that contract?

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Or does that contract like, stay firm?

Dr. Annie: You know, they’re welcome to reassess, but the funny thing is when, you know, it’s happened, people have come back to us by the time they come back a year or two, three years later, like our algorithm, like our often has changed in a sense where, like, well, now a psychiatrist in Ohio is already 200 more dollars.

Dr. Annie: So, like. Stick with where you’re at. Let’s not. Yeah. So we’re happy to talk to people if they’re like, I think I made a mistake. Like, I think, you know, this is different than I thought. We’re happy to talk it through, but it doesn’t happen too often that way. So yeah, it makes a lot of

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: sense. Yeah. You’ll just stick with what you got.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Cause you’re probably getting a really good deal on having a collaborating doc on your, on your payroll. That’s really, really cool.

Dr. Annie: To date, we have I swear on a Bible, we have never raised prices on a current client. And a lot of doctors have complained to me a lot, like, when am I ever going to get a raise for helping this person for three years?

Dr. Annie: And I’m like, we’re trying to build goodwill and just help people out. So it’s not really on our radar right now. I, you know, I cannot say this will last for all of eternity, but we really try. Like if we give you that. price. And then it stays like, so you’re not shocked later. Yeah,

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: that makes a lot of sense.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: So I guess I would like to know, and again, from your experience of owning a family medicine practice from now owning a business, you know, and working all these different things, different hats and motherhood and everything, what advice would you have for an NP or an RN that’s thinking about starting their own practice that you would.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Give them at the start of their journey as they’re either moving into owning their own practice. What would you give as advice? I mean, Annie, you’ve got so much experience.

Dr. Annie: Yeah, I think I have a lot I could talk all day on this topic.

Dr. Annie: I love entrepreneurship and I love the interesting things our clients are doing, but I. I guess two, two biggies. One, this has been true for me, like, and so many of our clients, like take the time to find mentorship, like, I’m not talking about the collaborator. I just mean like business mentorship. If you’re, if you’re starting a medical practice of any type, find someone who’s a couple steps ahead of you and having success, the hardest part is probably finding that person, to be honest.

Dr. Annie: Right. You might want to look beyond your community because you might be in competition with that person. So like maybe look a state or two away and see, do research on Yelp or, you know, however, you know, all these different medical review sites, like find someone very similar background, perhaps yourself doing what you want to do.

Dr. Annie: And you’ll probably be able to gauge from like their website and Yelp reviews, Google reviews, if they’re succeeding or not, at least generally speaking, and then talk to them and don’t be afraid to offer something. I mean, they’re probably super darn busy. So, like, offer. Money like, Hey, let’s, I would love you to be my consultant.

Dr. Annie: I can pay you a hundred a week. We could talk an hour a week, like whatever, you know, you think is fair to them. And I know it’s hard when you don’t have income coming in just yet, but it’s, it’s worth his weight in gold. Like the money I spent on some business, just like I had one particular guy, Brett, I met every week for an hour.

Dr. Annie: I mean, he didn’t have all the answers, of course. I mean, he’s not doing it for me. Like, it’s just like a sounding board even like, hey, I’m thinking like I should set this up this way. And then having his fresh perspective because he’s done it, he started 10, you know, businesses of his own. So like he, he knows more than me.

Dr. Annie: Yeah. And so that, that’s a biggie, I would say the mentorship thing. Second. For me to like, I am thankfully helping so many nurse practitioners and finding great success with cloud ring docs. It’s blowing up and scaling so fast. We’re just hiring like every day some new employee to work for us behind the scenes.

Dr. Annie: It’s super exciting. But I did probably about five other businesses before this that all were pretty much failures. Some had moderate, mild success. Some were total flops. One, I lost a lot of money on. So like, I’m just saying, like, I think some people see me like, Oh, you have it so easy. You just, you know, set this up and whatever.

Dr. Annie: No. It’s a school of hard knocks. And I hear that from a lot of our clients. I love talking to our clients who are like crazy successful. Chris Bustamante, he’s doing aesthetics in New York city, Manhattan started with one chair in like a coworking, coworking, medical office space thing. It was a kind of a cool thing they had in, I think a couple of cities have this sort of thing.

Dr. Annie: So he got his like one little room, one room office with one chair and. Flash forward, like one year, not long, like one year and he’s, he made a million in revenue that year. Wow. Unbelievable. And now he’s on track, I think for 2 million this year. So like, and he came just out of NP school, like zero experience.

Dr. Annie: He blew it up. He found a great niche. He marketed, he had learned a lot of marketing lessons. From past failures. And it was like the stars aligns like all the things he had learned from the past. I’m so excited for, you know, Chris, but so many people are like that. And me too, just like the failure is just that, you know, you’re falling forward.

Dr. Annie: Don’t let it make you fall backward.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Yeah, I think that’s such good advice that I love that success is like an EKG line success is like this line that goes all over but it’s kind of slowly going up. You know, you just have to keep trying and seeing what you find. And I just think it. Couldn’t have happened to a better person, Annie, that you were able to find something that is scaling and growing and that you’re so dedicated.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: And I just see it in your voice. I feel it in your energy. You care about nurse practitioners. You want to make sure that they are getting the things that they need and you want to be able to provide a good, valuable resource that supports us. Doesn’t take advantage of us and gets us to the goals that we want in life.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: And you’re going to be successful because that is like totally the recipe for making something that succeeds is by putting others at the center, creating a product or service that is making sure that you’re keeping the right things in the middle and you’re keeping their goals and the priorities and the principles that you want right at the middle.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: So I just think. Annie, that’s just, that gets me fired up. It makes me so happy to promote your stuff on my podcast and to put you out there as someone that people can trust. That nurse practitioners can put their faith behind. And yeah, give us shameless plug for your business, for people to check you out as we close up.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Shameless

Dr. Annie: plug time. Yeah. Well, visit us on collaborating docs. com or honestly, if you just Google collaborating docs. We should be the first search term if our, if our Google ads are dialed in, right? So you’ll find us there. But yeah, right on there, you can book right on the main page to talk to someone.

Dr. Annie: Even if we love talking to people, you could be two years away from wanting to start anything. We still love talking to you. Like our nurse practitioners have lots of good resources and advice. So just. Talk to somebody there’s like, we’re not going to hound you the rest of your life. Like we love just talking about interesting business ideas and see what, what you’re thinking.

Dr. Annie: So, you know, we’d love that. The other bonus, if you go to our website on the top, we have a section I’m probably most proud of called services our NPs love, and that’s been cultivated by our actual clients, like, Oh, I use them for my billing. Oh, I use them for credentialing. And if people are like, love it, love it, love it, then.

Dr. Annie: We leave it up. If someone says, actually, I had a really bad experience with them, then we remove it. So the ones up there are well liked and that, that can save some time. If you’re starting out, there’s so many things you have to figure out, like, you know, the legalities, the business setup formation, all the things.

Dr. Annie: So at least there’s like a resource. For anybody, you can go today and just see it on the website. I

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: saw that you had Katie Harris, who’s been on nursepreneurs. She’s been on there. So yeah, she’s great. And I wasn’t surprised to see her on this, on that resource. But you guys, I was like, yeah, she’s pretty good.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: She’s pretty solid. So yeah, fantastic. Well, again, thank you for coming on the podcast today and sharing what it is that your business is doing. I typically do rapid fire. I didn’t know if you’d be open to it. I don’t really do it with my MPs, but are you? We’re going to bring you in as an honorary NP. You ready

Dr. Annie: for it?

Dr. Annie: I love it. Thank you. Appreciate it. Let’s do it. I don’t know what this is, but I’m ready. If it’s anything like, what is the show on Bravo? The talk show. He has something like that. I think. Rapid Fire or something.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Yeah. Okay. Are you ready? Dr. Annie, let’s do it. I’m ready. What is your favorite holiday?

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Christmas. Christmas. 100%. You have kids. That’s totally it. If you had to pick a character to play you in life, what character would you choose?

Dr. Annie: Ooh, not an actress, like the kid, like a cartoon

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: character. If you’re like this character, cartoon

Dr. Annie: character. So in the cartoon mindset right now, I’m like, could it be blue?

Dr. Annie: And you’re like, I don’t know. You’re all like, what do you got? Yeah. Oh goodness. See, that’s the thing with entrepreneurship. You stop watching TV. Right? Like that’s the first thing to go. Yeah. I am so out of date with pop culture. So I’ll have to go with like my kids. Yeah, one of their little characters, probably.

Dr. Annie: I can’t even think. My son is all into Bluey right now and Paw Patrol.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: I’m impressed with Bluey. I like the mom for Bluey. She’s like, she’s gold in a lot of ways. She’s so patient. I like her accent. All right. And then, okay, so you said you don’t watch TV. What’s your favorite dessert?

Dr. Annie: Ooh, anything chocolate.

Dr. Annie: Let’s do chocolate cake. Yeah.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Chocolate cake. Okay. I feel like I’m so cheesecake. Anything cheesecake, strawberry cheesecake. I just like it plain. Don’t do anything fancy with it. Don’t make it red velvet. Don’t make it like, no, just plain. Throw a cheese, throw a, throw a strawberry on it and I’m a happy girl.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Like that’s what I like. I don’t know. Well, do you do the

Dr. Annie: ricotta or more like the New York, like cream cheese cheesecake?

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Oh, no, no, no. If I’m going to do it. I mean, like, I try to be healthy. Okay, let’s be real. Okay, truth, I try to be healthy. Sure. So if you have a ricotta and like a normal one, if the ricotta is still really good, I’ll probably give it a shot.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: But like, true, like, ignoring calories, ignoring all the health stuff. Give me that regular cheesecake, throw a strawberry on it. Leave me alone for like 30 minutes. Let me eat that thing. You know,

Dr. Annie: I get you. I was just in New York city. It’s like, I can’t. Yeah. I’m there a day. I’m like, where’s the cheesecake place again?

Dr. Annie: Like we got to get that. Yes.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: Well, I love to hanging out. Thank you for your time today, Annie. Enjoy the rest of your day. Thanks for

Dr. Annie: having me. Super fun. Have a great one. Yes.

Dr. Sandra Pagenta: And guys, don’t forget to enjoy the journey of your career. Thanks for hanging out.