Latest / The ROI Online Podcast / [Feature Friday] Dr. Kris Wusterhausen on How Individualized Healthcare Can Help You Live the Life You Want - The ROI Online Podcast Ep. 26

Transcript

[Feature Friday] Dr. Kris Wusterhausen on How Individualized Healthcare Can Help You Live the Life You Want - The ROI Online Podcast Ep. 26 · The ROI Online Podcast

• 0:02
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: We're always saying that, you know, prevention does wonders, instead of just, here's the pill to treat the symptom, but trying to get to the root cause of the problem. Like one of my pet peeves is type two diabetes used to the protocol. When I went to medical school The first thing that was the treatment that physicians were supposed to institute for type two diabetes was nutritions dietary counts actually teach a person that in many cases, type two diabetes can be cured by simply losing weight eating properly. I always joke the diabetic diet is nothing more than healthy. And now when you look at that protocol, that's gone. So basically, the American Diabetes Association has told the physicians give up on nutritional counseling, just go straight to medicine. And, and I just think that a lot of times there are patients that we can really change their lives in those scenarios if you just take the time and maybe give them a chance, but you know, you have to find the right patients as well. Not everyone wants to truly change Their lives in a better
• 1:01
  Steve Brown: way. Hi, everybody. Welcome to the ROI online podcast where we believe you. The courageous entrepreneurs of our day are the invisible heroes of our economy. You not only improve our world with your ideas, your grit and your passion, but you make our world better. I'm Steve Brown. And this is a place where we have great conversations with winners just like you while we laugh and learn together. Welcome back, everybody to the ROI online podcast and today, I'm excited to introduce you to my guest, Dr. Chris booster Hausen. Dr. Kris is a client and a friend. His clinic is the research clinic and Dr. Kris, welcome to the ROI online podcast.
• 1:52
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Thank you. Everybody's doing well today.
• 1:54
  Steve Brown: All right, awesome. So, Chris, the folks who listen to this, they learn things they, they're they deserve to meet you. The folks that I introduce, I'm proud to introduce and so give us a little background please about your backstory about how you ended up with the research clinic and why?
• 2:17
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Well, I always say that the research clinic actually started with one patient and that was myself. I'm a board certified family physician, I found myself in the in my mid 30s, overweight, all of my lab parameters were trending in the wrong direction, blood pressure, cholesterol, blood sugar, that sort of thing. And I realized I kind of woke up one day and realized that if I kept the same path myself that I probably would not I probably would fall into the trend and visions, which is not that long of a lifespan. So I started looking into different forms of treating patients, more dietary hormones, of course, and different things and started I actually linked up with a company called antigenics and trained and worked with him for about three years, then decided that I kind of wanted to put my own spin on it. And so that's where the research basically came from was was just wanting to treat patients in a different way than the traditional medicine typically allows, looking for those patients that really want to think outside the box on how to get healthy. Not always just a prescription. Sometimes it is a prescription, but not always just a prescription. And just, like I said, thinking outside the box, and so we've evolved with time. We're always adding new things to our practice, but that's kind of where it started at.
• 3:35
  Steve Brown: It's interesting the mean, there are when we go to the doctor, the insurance company seems to dictate what most general practice physicians can consider as far as a treatment or even spend the time to to investigate what's going on with you. One of our clients his his name is Chris kresser. He's a An author, and he's a functional medicine physician. And so one day asked him what's functional medicine? And I love the way that he put it as basically you have all these various doctors, you have a doctor, maybe a dermatologist, maybe you have a internist, maybe you have a cardiologist, but what's missing is that quarterback for all these folks, they're not talking together. And so whatever one physician may prescribe may be impacting some other aspect that the other physician is. And so what I what I like about what you do as well is that you, you conduct these labs and it's really didn't sink in to me until you know, I read those articles about eat, you need eat more spinach and spinach does this and so for maybe three or four weeks until we get tired of it. We eat more spinach because we're convinced that's going to help us but what we're doing here is just guessing And the beautiful thing that you're doing is lab based data that you can measure over time to see what's effective and what, what we should do.
• 5:06
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Absolutely, yeah. And it's just, you know, I'm fortunate enough that my patients, most of my patients were all looking to do better. Which was something I felt like I kind of lost in general family practice, like you were saying, it's so guided by the insurance companies and what you can and can't do. And just the amount of paperwork that a traditional physician goes through on a daily basis dealing with insurances. And so we went to a, you know, it was a big leap of faith to go to a cash based practice. You know, what, what my customers supported, were they not supported and, you know, we've been very blessed on the support that we've received, you know, from the cash paying community and how they're looking for, you know, that they see the benefit, I guess, and what we do and that truly means a lot to all of us here.
• 5:53
  Steve Brown: So when you talk about patients are folks that you're working with, you're working with both male and Female at a certain point in life, maybe give us a really good clear picture of that, please.
• 6:07
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Yeah, so I mean, we treat all types of course men and women. I think our practices slightly skewed to women, I think it's about 5545. Last time we looked at our demographics, and our probably our average age is 35 to 65 is probably the our wheelhouse, but we have, you know, probably down to as young as 10 or 12. In our practice up to 80 something years old, maybe, actually 90 now, I think it's my oldest patient. So but you know, it's generally what we hear that middle aged person who is starting to see some of the negative effects of aging and, and wanting to possibly slow that process down. You know, when we started doing this, it was called anti aging and we realized that there is no such thing as anti aging. That's why the it's become age management medicine because we're going to age no matter what the key is aging. gracefully hopefully and say I believe what we do makes people live longer. But I know for sure that it improves their quality of life and that's what I think most people are really looking for is quality, quality, maybe even over quantity but quality as long as we can get it so important.
• 7:17
  Steve Brown: So what events trigger someone to start investigating or considering what you're offering and, and kind of give us an idea of what those therapies or procedures are, what exactly it is that you're addressing, and how
• 7:34
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: well so the trigger is different for everyone but most the time it's something is changing in their lives and obviously not usually for the positive You know, they're maybe feeling more fatigued or maybe they're noticing that they're gaining weight when they used to not gain weight or sexual function is a big is a large part of our practice. Maybe there are erections aren't as good as they once were, or maybe a female sensitivity isn't what it once was. But generally it's something in the gamuts of just not feeling quite like they used to that brings them into my practice. And we get some patients that are actually doing really well that are just referrals from other people and saying, hey, you need to come in and be part of this practice. And overall, they're doing well and we just tweak small things, but most the time there's something going on in their life that they just don't feel good about. And, you know, depending on what it is, are, generally we always start with some form of a lab panel after we assess what the needs are. And you know, like other physicians that are in my type of field, we we draw a much larger panel than the average physician generally does. Looking at more things than just your cholesterol, your kidney, your liver, your red blood cells, you know, and thyroid and being deemed healthy and Altidore you go obviously, hormone replacement is a large part of our practice. That's kind of what we started on was hormone replacement testosterone replacement in men and women. Estrogen replacement in in females as well. We've moved over into, which I believe is the future of functional and age management medicine is peptide therapy. I truly believe that's the next wave of wellness medicine is peptide therapy and peptides are chained amino acids. We have thousands of peptides naturally occurring in our body. And scientists have been able to isolate these peptides figure out what their function is. And then we're able to use them to augment those functions to get improve on those functions as we age and, you know, we have peptides that can pan the skin peptides that can give you erections peptides that can increase libido peptides that can burn fat and increase muscle peptides that help heal tissue, ligaments and tendons and so on and so on. They're just amazing, amazing products. And so that's a large part of what we do. And then you know, also have our sexual function clinic which we do a procedure called polar wave which is an approved device to increase blood flow to the penis and we have very good success with that it's non invasive, of Agile rejuvenation and women. And then I have a actually a personal training gym in the back where we have a trainer here five days a week, training patients on what we believe is the most important thing which is with funk with fitness, which is your core. And I've actually just haven't even announced yet we've added ozone therapy to our practice in the last two weeks, which we're really excited to have ozone as part of our practice with with just the so it's just ozone is oh three versus two which is oxygen and it's a it's a sauna that you sit in and basically steams on to the skin and ozone has a great anti inflammatory properties.
• 12:19
  Steve Brown: So you're you're in Texas, and you're in Weatherford, Weatherford
• 12:25
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: and right outside of Fort Worth,
• 12:27
  Steve Brown: right. So the folks that you generally treat, are they in that area, or do you treat folks from all around?
• 12:35
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: So I mean, obviously, most of our patients, the majority of our patients are are within probably a 30 mile radius. But we do have out of state patients as well. We have patients that I've heard about us and will travel in to see us and the greatness of modern medicine today is we can do so much of it just like we're doing today with this podcast, you know, we can jump on and luckily right now the one good thing I guess with COVID is they've allowed us to use these platforms extensively with no HIPAA violations. So we're able to jump on a zoom call or something of that nature, even FaceTime. And, you know, handle a lot of these visits, because, you know, we can get blood drawn anywhere. You know, we still like to do face to face visits, at least once a year so we can lay hands on listen to heart, lungs and take a look at you. But yeah, we do have out of state patients as well. Some of our faith patients relocate, they stick with us, usually when they leave referrals from other patients but the Metroplex Dallas Fort Worth is certainly where I get the majority of my patients.
• 13:41
  Steve Brown: One thing that I've read one time, modern medicine was predominantly design him and the person, what do they call them? The protocols that you address these diseases? Pretty much man focus Or, or male focused? And the truth is that the way that you would address a female situation is way different than you would a man. Tell us to learn a bit about the inside that you apply and those evaluations?
• 14:18
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Well, and so and I would probably even take it further. It's just there are no set protocols for for that fit all. Everybody's an individual and we need to look at them all differently, you know, you have to get, you know, women have different emotional stresses and things that sometimes men don't have their physiologies their friends. So I think it's always just important that we look at every patient as a complete individual and what's going on in their life because many times it's, it's I always joke but it's not only being a doctor, but it's being a counselor as well sometimes and trying to learn what's really going on in their life what's really given them stress. You know, I have my own doctor that does that with me, you know, because Just because I'm good at telling everybody else what to do doesn't mean I'm always necessarily good at doing it myself. And so I have to have an accountability partner too. So my physician has to keep me straight. And so I just think it's just really important that we look at each person as a complete individual and not just stick them in a cutting. That's one of my biggest pet peeves is the protocol system is just everybody just sucks in a protocol and down the path they go. And the truth is, I don't work for a lot of patients, but it certainly won't work for all patients. And you just have to make sure you're looking at him individually. And, and when things don't work. You know, I always say protocols are great until people don't respond. And that's whenever you have to really practice medicine and get involved and say, okay, what's different about this patient? Why is this patient not feeling the results? I think they should because maybe the labs look better, but they're not feeling better. And that's where you just have to really dive into the just to everything of their life to figure out what's going on with them.
• 16:01
  Steve Brown: Such a vulnerable feeling when you go see a physician for a challenge that you're having. And it's in the back of your mind, although you may not what's in the back of your mind, you wouldn't write it down. But the concern is, are they really discerning What is wrong with me? Are they? Or are they so pressed for time to quickly get into the next appointment? And only checking off the approved? We can only look in these corners and And oftentimes, they'll say, just keep what you're doing. Keep doing what you're doing, and, and you and I both go, really? Do you know what I'm doing? Cuz I mean chicken fried steak, and, you know, right. That's what I'm doing. And you're saying, keep doing what I'm doing when everything that we read and stuff says, Ah, you're probably not doing it right.
• 16:51
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Well, my own health was the biggest reason that I changed my practice. But the second reason was because of I'll never forget it was actually President Obama. And I'm not here to bash President Obama, but he made a statement when Obamacare was about to come out. And he said, every physician should be happy because they're going to get to see more patients now. And I've yet to meet very many physicians who are looking to see more patients unless they've just started their practice. You know, when I started my family practice, we had about 20 minutes for each patient, which had been sucked down about 12 minutes whenever I left traditional medicine and, and as I tell my patients, there is just absolutely no chance that in 12 minutes, I can truly get to the root of the problem, treat it and you understand it and get you out my door in 12 minutes. It's just not feasible. And that's one of the things I like my go into the cache model is I spend most of the time my new patient, sometimes two hours, maybe longer. You know, sometimes we'll break it up in two or three visits. It's, you know, maybe an hour each time for two or three times until we can really feel like we've got everything laid out on the table telling conductor cards to know where to go with this. And you simply can't do that model and n Insurance based practice, you just simply can't you won't make any money you'll close. And so I think that my patients in the cash pay model and I think they see the value in what they pay for what they get. And I think that's ultimately what we're all looking for with our money is, do we see the value? You know, do we see the return on investment of our dollar and if we do, then we feel like it's worth it. As I tell, like, you know, we're in the capital of horses here. This is the cutting capital of the world Parker county where I'm at and so sometimes when I'll get a patient in and maybe they think that the cost is too high or something of that nature, I'll always just typically always works out I'll say, you know, I look out the window which truck is yours? Oh, it's that truck over there. Oh, that looks like an $80,000 truck with all the you know, add ons. You know, you'll spend money on your vehicle, but you won't spend money on yourself and you have to kind of get out of that thought that your body is just going to hold up no matter what you do to it because you don't have that feeling when it comes to a vehicle or house. But you have some people have that vehicle with themselves that we're into principle we can treat our bodies poorly and expect it always to work in our favor and it just doesn't work that lands we know at some point it will bite us.
• 19:09
  Steve Brown: Yeah, and there's not only that facing your mortality, but it's almost like you have to admit to yourself that I need some, some help. And I'm not who I see myself as right. I think about you ever. Did you ever think about when you dream? What age do you see yourself in your dreams? Right? And
• 19:32
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: we were just talking about this the other day, it's kind of like when you walk in the mirror and you look in the mirror real quick, like, hang on, that guy looks a little older than I've, you know, I think he is. And so, it's funny. We just had this discussion the other day, I didn't think of it that way in my dreams, but it's kind of like, what you perceive yourself as. And then you, you maybe look at yourself and go, Hey, who's that older guy showing up in a mirror now as we start to age, but, you know, I just did like I said, I always just try to convince my patients that you know, we maintenance Everything in our lives and we have to maintenance ourselves, we have to, you know, I'm a guy I'm a typical guy, I love my hobbies, old cars and so I always say, you know, we got to rotate the tires to the engine up occasionally we can't just expect to run the wheels off of it and everything to be okay and, and once you can get a person has that step and I think they start seeing the value in what we do and, and very quickly, I think they start to see that we're, you know, I'm an osteopathic physician and, and one of the things I actually chose to be an osteopathic physician. And you know, we're always saying that, you know, prevention does wonders, instead of just here's the pill to treat the symptom but trying to get to the root cause of the problem. Like one of my pet peeves is type two diabetes used to the protocol when I went to medical school The first thing that was the treatment that physicians were supposed to institute for type two diabetes was nutritions dietary counseling. actually teach a person that in many cases, type two diabetes can be cured as simple Losing weight eating properly. I always joke and diabetic diet is nothing more than a healthy diet. And now when you look at that protocol that's gone. So basically the American Diabetes Association has told the physicians give up on nutritional counseling, just go straight to medicines and, and I just think that a lot of times there are patients that we can really change their lives in those scenarios if we would just take the time and maybe give them the chance. But you know, you have to find the right patients as well. Not everyone wants to truly change their life in a better way. When it comes to life and fitness and health. You know, lifestyle.
• 21:37
  Steve Brown: Dr. Chris kresser really talks about that, that it actually the the diabetic situation or the diabetes situation is a, an impending event that's very significant for the health of our population. And yet, yet there's simple ways to address it to change up the course that most of us are on and We would be surprised at how many people in our population fit into that. That what is it that you call that designation that you're in that state and are approaching a situation where you're going to have to address it?
• 22:20
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Hmm. Absolutely. And again, I just I think that if you give a lot of those patients the chance to change their lives, they will is just in the traditional I call it the traditional cattle chute of you know, Family Practice internal medicine. You know, you're seeing 3040 patients a day and you're so desensitized to this because you're so used to the average patient Just give me a pill Doc, give me a pill and you know, when you just get into that mantra of just give me another medicine, another medicine, and it kind of goes along with hormone replacement as we always joke, you know, the 50 year old lady comes With new onset depression at 50 never had depression before and ever does has no reason to be depressed other than she is depressed. In other words, no one died. There's no financial issues marriage is good. No one bothers to look at her hormones, they just stick her on Lexapro or something of that nature and, and one of the doctors I learned from used to say or is probably still does says she didn't have a Lexapro deficiency. She had hormonal imbalance. And yeah, the Lexapro may cover up some symptoms and may make her depression better, but the side effects of the medication many times can be over a 10 year span can be quite severe. And so, you know, if you just would have gotten to the root cause of the problem, you could have treated that and not only does the depression go away most of the time, but they feel tremendously better to and their whole life gets better. And so and you know, he goes to this whole cascade of pathway of how it just started with Lexapro and five years later, you end up on five medicines because of the weight. Maybe you gained On the antidepressants that cause high blood pressure, and then and then diabeetus. And, you know, you take little Susie at 50, who was healthy and at 60 she takes six medicines and her life is kind of out of order and it was all just because she didn't get a functional Look at her overall health and get it treated properly. I'm not trying to say that all traditional medicine is bad. I certainly use traditional medicine in my practice, I I by no means am 100% alternative medicine physician. Heck, I probably still lean heavier traditional medicine, I do alternative medicine, but it's about blending those two practices into one for your patients and individualizing it for each patient because some patients want alternative medicine. Some patients want very little to none. It just depends on their beliefs. And as I always say I'm here to educate. I'm not here to tell you what's right for you. I do not do that. I was just talking to a patient on Saturday night and she got breast cancer six years ago and chose not to Have any of chemotherapy or radiation. And, you know, at first I thought she was kind of crazy to be honest with you was when I was kind of getting going into this and she had a stage one cancer and I'm like, why not just take care of it, your cure rate is extremely high. And she said I don't want to. And she she's now six, seven years old has had no issues and did alternative treatments. So, you know, it's whatever, but she was educated. She made her own decision. She knew what the risks were, she knew what the possible benefits were. And that was right for her. So it's whatever's right for the patient. As long as they're educated in their decisions. I'm good with it.
• 25:38
  Steve Brown: Want to pause here just for a moment and talk to you about a program that we have just released called the ROI quickstart Academy for authors every day. I talk to business owners just like you who struggle with quickly getting their fundamentals in place. We want to create a great foundation and we want to grow our business but But the things that are in our way, our lack of knowledge about the specifics we should put in place, what kind of technology, what kind of messaging and what kind of campaigns. And that problem exists for authors as well. And we just chill so good with authors because, well, I'm an author, and I understand everything that you struggle with, you have a great idea you have a great book, but what do you want to do? You want to get your book in front of more people, you want to make it easy for them to find you learn how they can schedule a time to talk with you hire you for a conference, or maybe sign up for the services that your book promotes. So what is the Quickstart Academy for authors? Imagine working with a small group of like minded authors, and the experts from the ROI quickstart team. It's a great way to get your messaging clear to be confident with the technology in your marketing automation, and how to run a strategic campaign to get you more have what you want from the investment of your book. To learn more about the Quickstart Academy for authors, you can visit ROI online.com or click in the link in the show notes below. And now, back to this episode. Yeah, I was thinking, you know, most of the traditional medicine or general physicians, I don't think it's their intent to do that. I think it's the constraint of the system that they're trying to do the best in that doesn't allow them probably the time and I imagine it weighs on them or grinds on them over time. And it would be courageous decision to become more of alternative medicine or or take the path that you've done. You don't have to say no to a bunch of work, you're going to have to change up your whole practice, you're going to have to approach things from a non insurance pay system. So that's a huge transformation. You went down.
• 28:04
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: I talked to other physicians that are looking at doing this as well. And the good news is I did it earlier in my practice. I don't know if I was sitting here today, at 48 years old that I would have the courage to do it now. And like just like anyone, none of us want to take a step back financially or anything of that nature, but you have to look at it as a setback to move forward. It can be risky. The good news, though is is that more and more physicians are doing this. physicians are leaving the traditional practice of medicine at an incredible rate, because of burnouts, and I totally agree with you that I doubt very few physicians are happy with the type of medicine they're practicing, but the constraints that that's all it allows. You have to see this many patients you know that this common thought that physicians are just making millions of dollars and, you know, living in their yachts and it's just not the case. I mean, I have patients that make You know, way more money than I ever made in traditional medicine that, you know, don't have near the education that physicians have. And I think that physicians do agree to be, should be compensated for, you know, going through medical school residency, all the sacrifice that they've gone through. And so you'd be surprised at what a lot of physicians make and, and to do that they have to see 30 to 40 patients a day to even do that. I used to have a staff I had two PhDs myself, and we had over 20 total employees. I now run a practice with four because when you cut out billing and insurance, I mean you cut out so much of your practice, you just don't have to have that anymore. So I don't have to make nearly as much gross to make the net and so it's just a much in my opinion, a much better way and and we really find it found a niche was I'm very lucky that there's a lot of people in America, especially in my area. are self employed. They have insurance, but I call it catastrophic insurance that only kicks in when they get to 578 $10,000. And they realize that if it's a normal year, they're not going to come close to that. And they'd much rather pay me, you know, two or $3,000 a year to know that they're going to get VIP type care and get much better care than what they were getting before. They just see the value in that. And it's a control cost for them. They're like, Okay, my, my primary care needs are taken care of for this price, and they can budget it in and off they go. I mean, I've got all types of patients in my practice. I'm actually surprised sometimes that people that are willing to pay it, but they see the value in it. And I think that's important. And America is moving to more of a, you know, I personally love concierge type services. I mean, just to know that I'm being catered to a little bit is worth it to me. Again, I see the value in it. I'm willing to do it and I think a lot of Americans are the same way.
• 30:57
  Steve Brown: Totally get spoiled. sounds like to me You there was a point where you transition from seeing yourself as a doctor, to seeing yourself more as a business person was and that was a big impact in your decision.
• 31:13
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Yeah, you know, and I'm still learning. I always joke that I feel like physicians start off their practice a step behind. We're most physicians have no type of business background. There's a few that maybe did some sort of business and then change their career path. But most of us have no business background. Medical School has no business classes associated with us, which I think is a really big failure on their part. I think if they just had the basics. I can't tell you how many times the first contract a physician signed they sign a ridiculous contract that affects the next five to 10 years of their life because, you know, they, they weren't good business people. They didn't get the lawyer to look at the contract. We're naturally trusting people. We're physicians. We want to help think everybody's there to help each other. And then you kind of get burned on that. And so I will admit, I've made bad business decisions. And you know, what we've learned from those things. And I think I'm at the point now, where I'm a decent businessman, I don't consider myself great. But I think I'm getting better with each year that goes by certainly looking at things differently. And because there's medicine, and there's business, and you have to merge the two together, but you have to, because as my wife would tell you, you know, her, she's my office manager, you know, I want to do everything. And I will, let's do it all. It'll help my patients but then you also have to look at it. Is it financially feasible? Is it going to give something to my patients, but is it also going to let us keep our doors open? Because I'm no good to anybody if I can't keep on doors open. And so, you know, we've actually even though we're adding things we're downsizing at the same time because I felt like my practice was getting a little bit bloated, if that makes sense. Yes, I do believe you can do too much you can. You can. You can do so many things that the patient loses track of what you actually do. Maybe you as a provider lose track of what you actually do, like, Where is my focus. So I've kind of decided in my practice that like to do 5678 things really, really well. And I'm okay with a guy down the street may be doing something that I don't do that I like, and I can refer to them for that procedure or whatever, and just do what I do. And so I've tried to, I used to be nearly obsessed with what everyone else was doing. And I've kind of learned, I don't care. It's what I'm doing. And people come to me for, you know, I believe for what I do. And I need to be strong in that conviction and just stick with what I feel strongly about what I think helps my patients what I want to actually do because I don't enjoy it. It's going to show in my practice, and I have to be enthusiastic about doing it as well. And so because everything we do here, we do as well. You know, There's not a procedure here that is we recommended that one of us or all of us haven't done on ourselves because I have to be able to show you that I believe in it that much.
• 34:09
  Steve Brown: So do you consult other physicians who may be are considering to move into the area? You are?
• 34:17
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Yeah, absolutely. We I'm always consulting with other physicians, and we're, it's a it's not a huge network. I mean, we're talking about 20 to 20,000 physicians across the country, but, you know, it really turns into a small network so maybe 50 doctors or so and, and when new doctors come, I'm always willing to help someone get started in this business because I think we need that there's no way in my lifetime we're going to saturate the market with these type of physicians. And so I always try and I try to help them learn from the mistakes that I made because I would really hate for other physicians to make the same exact mistakes that I made. So I try to help with that actually just got hired on with bio t which is I was with him For years and had left them for a while, and I've came back to them just now they've hired me on to kind of do exactly that. And one of the three or four physicians that's going to be in charge of training all the physicians on peptide therapy, but also just helping kind of with practice management and mentorship, I guess, is what you would say, other providers that are coming into the system. So I actually really, really enjoy that but something that I could see myself one day doing a whole lot more is more on the consulting side and the training side, because that is something I truly enjoy doing.
• 35:34
  Steve Brown: So speaking of business decisions, you had a business development challenge, when we ran into each other kind of give us the Where were you then when you we ran into each other.
• 35:49
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: So we were all over the place. Marketing wise is has always been thank god we're with you guys now because we actually have a focus now but more marketing has always been the most difficult part of my practice. We're not trained as physicians how to market. We just, we would we spent so much money going in circles, you know, you throw money at, you know, let's put it in this magazine and or let's do this billboard or let's put this radio ad but there was no consistency to anything and we would work with this person and then that person and there was never any real plan it was just what kind of the flow was of that month and and my wife and I percent that we never could seem to get on the same page because, you know, I was more into traditional marketing and she was more into probably where we should have been, but we never could seem to, to merge those thoughts. And then we had a patient that came in actually and I and I've told you this before I still think that her social media some of the best I've ever seen and they sell they make custom ranch gates but she does Such a good job of keeping it interesting that it's still something I look at every single day to this day years later, because I just I love what they do. And I sat down with her and talk to her about how did you do all this and that's when she talked, she turned me on to story branding, and I read the book. And then it really kind of hit home with me about what we want him to do with our practice. And then we were fortunate enough to find you guys and, you know, y'all really helped us not just figure out what to do today, but what to do next month, six months, a year from now, and put a real plan in action versus just swirling around in circles and, and I'm the worst about wanting immediate results. And, and I know that something you my wife, Sam, everybody is talking about, you know, it is a slow burn and builds. And we've started to really see that over the last six to nine months. I mean, I despite COVID I feel so good about where my practice is right now. And I think there's nothing That can Stress Stress The, the structure of my practice more than COVID could, and the fact that we're still, by no means am I about to retire, but you know, to still be a profitable practice, despite COVID I think is is just such a feather in our cap of where we're headed with this and, and how patients, you know, see how we can help them through COVID versus just, you know, leaving us and, you know, waiting till COVID passes. So, you know, and I think the marketing has really helped us with that. And so, the biggest, you know, it's always a challenge working with your spouse. I wouldn't recommend it to most. I don't know if I'd recommend it to myself, but we're here. And I'm joking, but taking the marketing and putting it with you guys has eliminated the big the biggest negative factor that she and I have In our practice that we disagreed on when ever agreed on marketing. And, you know, not only was it affecting our business, it was affecting our marriage. No, man, I'm not saying we're about to get divorced, but you take this stuff home when you work together, and we just never could get on the same page. And the nice thing now is, it's just not even a discussion any longer. We just, I feel good about the marketing. You know, I'll pop in about every two weeks with Sam and ask what's going on and I look at everything that I get, but I'm just always so pleased with it. That is just it allows me to do what I want to do, which is see patients No offense, man, I would rather not have to do anything with marketing. Um, so and that's about where I'm at now with this, they bring me in and when I need to be a and then I guess that's the easiest way to say they involve me when I need to be otherwise I'm out of it. And I just get, you know, updates weekly, and I think it's great. It really works well for us. I couldn't be happier with where we're at with marketing. And the one thing that that I love working with you guys is y'all really Just like I do with patience, y'all understand that just because it works in Amarillo, or just because it works in Denver, doesn't mean it's going to work in Parker County. And that's the thing that just drove me crazy as you would get these large marketers, and you'd have to do this. It works perfect in Dallas. Well, we're not in Dallas. I mean, yes, we're, we're 45 minutes from Dallas, but we're not Dallas and anybody that lives here, understand that when you don't live here, you don't understand it. And so that's just what I really love is how y'all really listen to us about what we thought. And when something doesn't work, you know, then you're willing to say, hey, that didn't work. Let's try it this way. And I just really liked it because none of us expect perfection. We just want to know, hey, that didn't work. What are we going to do now to make it work? Anyway, that's, that's about what I would say about it. Overall, I
• 40:50
  Steve Brown: I suspect that the reason that you gel with us is because we approach the business development challenge that you you have and all the folks in your position have the same way that you would approach a patient that comes into you. You don't have a series silver bullet here or take this and Call me later, you go through a very structured process. And really your your product is your process. And that's why it becomes impactful for everyone because it's different. The process allows you to be effective with a variety of patients.
• 41:29
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Yeah, you know, there's there's always certain things that work everywhere, you know, you know, certain things that I can always recommend a good diet to everyone, and that's going to work pretty much universally. But then there's higher level things that you have to judge individually and I feel like he'll truly do that. And as far as I was saying, I'm like, that's exactly what it's exactly the same as just dealing with marketing versus dealing with medicine. It was the theories the same, you know, really get to know where the issues are, what can we do to help? And then let's get a real plan put together. That will fix this and get it moving in the right direction. And you know, and what also like is y'all you guys do a good job of quantifying it so that you can see that okay, I'm spinning blank and it's returning blank, okay? It's worth it. Versus back in the days where I would just throw money at something and you had no clue if it brought you business if it didn't bring you business. And so, you know, I still don't understand how it all works. I always joke that all these metrics and things I always joke, I trust you guys, and I have to, I just don't understand it. But you know, that's why I do what I do and you do what you do. And it's just, it's a matter of aligning yourself with good people that can plug your gaps and you know, that you can trust to do the job that you need them to do.
• 42:47
  Steve Brown: I think your secret weapon. The part that a lot of other teams that we work with is your wife, crisanta she's she's really the the anchor here and she's always she does the things are helped support us so we can do our job better. But she, she's able to manage you to go get you and get your input but she can also handle a lot. That's the beautiful thing. And I think that's one of the reasons I would definitely credit Yeah, we have a great team. But on your side, your wife is probably one of the most important reasons why our engagement has been so successful.
• 43:28
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Sure, I always joke she's much more important than she thinks she is sometimes and because she is my biggest supporter and always say hey, I'm the same way and it's not always rosy working with your spouse's on you know, vice and vice versa. I know she would say the same thing but we've we've kind of found our niche and my practice it's amazing when she's, I feel bad for it because I never give her any time off because when she's just not here, it just have great staff. They're awesome. It's not meant to be a negative for them, but she just keeps everything flowing and and we are a smaller community. And my patients come here just as much to see her as they come to see me. And so sometimes I'm busy and she'll go in the room and just, you know, visit with them for 30 minutes. And it means a lot, I think really means a lot to my patients to get an act. They know my kids, I mean, I kids are up, you're running around a lot of the time and they've, my patients have seen my kids grow up. And I've been very, very lucky cuz my left traditional medicine a nice, probably 10% of my practice followed me. But those 10% are really dedicated to me, they've been with me for 20 years, a lot of them so I'm just very, very lucky. You know, I, I feel like I truly know my patients who they are, what makes them tick, what's good, what's bad, we all have it. And so, it just when you can know a patient like that you can really get down to the core of how to help them. You know, like I said, we're, we're part counselor as well as physicians. So, you know, I always say physician slash wedding counselor, marriage counselors. You know, whatever. You know, we just try to if we don't know it, we try to involve people in our practice that can do it even better than we can so well, yeah, absolutely. She's a big part. She's a big important part of our practice.
• 45:11
  Steve Brown: Totally, totally agree. So what's the one question you wish? Every patient would ask you when they come in to see but they don't?
• 45:21
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Hmm.
• 46:41
  Steve Brown: Well, those all those things that you share there apply to a perfectly engagement with us as well. And it's interesting how similar the process is. So let's say I'm happened to be a physician that I'm listening to this podcast and it's been in the back of my head. This How can I transition my practice to to be more relevant or at least give me some more legs later because at the rate I'm going I'm probably going to burn out I'm having a very stressful life I'm having to see all these patients. How would someone maybe reach out with too you connect with you to just have a conversation to see what that might look like, for
• 47:25
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: any potential clients or physicians providers are always willing just shoot me an email at Dr. Chris at the research planning comm which is Dr. KFD research clinic comm I'll be glad to respond. I usually respond within a day in you know, whether it's a potential client or a physician, provider of any sort that just has questions. You know, that question as far as like how to transition is different for every provider. I have a a physician friend that recently he basically shut his practice down and has completely shunted his whole practice over to age management medicine. He's been lucky enough to have some successful ventures that he's financially able to do that most providers can't, I was not able to do it that way. So I had a basic a slow turnover process into going from traditional to cash pay practice that I can discuss with different providers of how to do but I guess it goes back to what we're saying. It just really depends on what they have going on. And how young are they? How old are they? How much time do we have to kind of make this transition? What kind of commitments does a person has? Can you take a step back for a couple of years because you will, a financial you will take a step back most likely for a couple of years, but then you can, you know, make it back and have such a better lifestyle. Once your self pay or cash practice.
• 48:53
  Steve Brown: Great. And if we're a potential patient, where maybe we weren't aware of Some way to approach medicine for us and the process, they would connect with you the same way correct?
• 49:07
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Yeah. Or they can simply go through our website, you know, the resurgeclinic.com. And we certainly have where you can put in your information and it'll go to one of our staff members, and somebody usually gets back within you within just a few hours. They're welcome to email me as well. Like I said, Dr. Kris, with a K at the research clinic calm. And we'll answer any questions that we can have. We need to have a phone consultation, we can do that as well. I'm very lucky, my staff is well versed in what we do. So most of the times my staff is able to answer all the questions for potential clients that they might need and how to get started with this.
• 49:40
  Steve Brown: Okay. You've been a great guest, Kris. Dr. Kris. Yes. And, and I appreciate and value for being on the ROI online podcast.
• 49:53
  Dr. Kris Wusterhausen: Well, thanks for your time as well, Steve, I really did enjoy it and looking forward to all of our work together in the future.
• 50:00
  Steve Brown: All right. Thank you, Dr. Chris. And that's a wrap. Thanks for listening to another fun episode of the ROI online podcast. For more, be sure to check out the show notes of this episode. And feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn where we can chat, and I can help direct you to the resources you're searching for. To learn more about how you can grow your business better, be sure to pick up your copy of my book, The Golden toilet at surprise, that golden toilet.com I'm Steve Brown, and we'll see you next week on another fun episode of the ROI online podcast.