Stop Chasing Prestige - Nathan Heilman - Optometrists Building Empires - Episode # 090

Optometrists Building Empires · Apr 23, 2026 · 40m · transcript

What if the most important thing you build as a practice owner isn't the practice itself, but the life and the people surrounding it? In this episode of Optometrists Building Empires, host Ankit Patel sits down with Dr. Nathan Heilman, eye disease specialist, former U.S. Navy optometry department leader, and founder of River Valley Eye Professionals. Nathan shares a career path that has wound through military service, a LASIK grind that nearly broke him, the pandemic-forced reckoning that changed how he leads, and ultimately, a deliberate decision to sell his practice to an MSO on his own…