Excerpt from “CNN: Doctors Going Broke” Article:“NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Doctors in America are harboring an embarrassing secret: Many of them are going broke. This quiet reality, which is spreading nationwide, is claiming a wide range of casualties, including family physicians, cardiologists and oncologists.” “Industry watchers say the trend is worrisome. Half of all doctors in the nation operate a private practice. So if a cash crunch forces the death of an independent practice, it robs a community of a vital health care resource.” “…an oncologist with a stellar reputation in the community who hasn’t taken a salary from his private practice in over a year. He owes drug companies $1.6 million, which he wasn’t reimbursed for. Dr. Neil Barth is that oncologist. He has been in the top 10% of oncologists in his region, according to U.S. News Top Doctors’ ranking. Still, he is contemplating personal bankruptcy. That move could shutter his 31-year-old clinical practice and force 6,000 cancer patients to look for a new doctor.” “The economics of providing health care in this country need to change. It’s too expensive for doctors,” he said. “I love medicine. I will find a way to refinance my debt and not lose my home or my practice.” If he does declare bankruptcy, he loses all of it and has to find a way to start over at 60. Until then, he’s turning away new patients whose care he can no longer subsidize… “Dr. Mike Gorman, a family physician in Logandale, Nev., recently took out an SBA loan to keep his practice running and pay his five employees.” “It is embarrassing,” he said. “Doctors don’t want to talk about being in debt.” But he’s planning a new strategy to deal with his rising business expenses and falling reimbursements.” “I will see more patients, but I won’t check all of their complaints at one time,” he explained. “If I do, insurance will bundle my reimbursement into one payment.” Patients will have to make repeat visits — an arrangement that he acknowledges is “inconvenient.” “This system pits doctor against patient,” he said. “But it’s the only way to beat the system and get paid.”

This CNN article got a whopping 10,000 people recommending it on Facebook and got 5000 comments.

Most people who have commented support the doctors and want to see doctors doing well. Here is one particular comment that I think summarizes the overall viewpoint:

“Take a good look around at doctors today and see if they are living a lifestyle any better than CPA’s, bankers, or business owners. My friend is a doctor and makes a six figure income, but that is not the income that he brings home after taxes and overhead. In fact he lives in a neighborhood with plumbers, college teachers, and other doctors in a comfortable but not wealthy neighborhood.

He drives a 15 year old truck, His income is taken up by all that is mentioned below. He must go to med school to become a doctor $200,00.00. He must run an office, pay malpractice, etc.

How many people with his education and work hours do you know do not make a six figure income? Should he do all of this for nothing? Is there any other profession wherein a person works like this an assumes tremendous responsibility for people’s lives and make less?

No one should assume that doctors should just do all of this for little income.

Ethics aside, medicine is a business.

Tell me any other profession where a person has this type of education and work hours and makes no money doing it and is happy. I really want to know.”

Dear Doctors,

If you do not realize that this fact of doctors working harder and making less is already upon ALL health care professionals, no matter how you think it would never happen to you, you will one day be caught with having to cut back drastically, having to struggle to support your kids to college and wonder why despite working so hard, you cannot build a nest egg and have to work beyond retirement age.

Maybe you are already at that point that despite the last 10-12 years of good economic growth, you do not have a nest egg and now with a crashing economy, that goal of having financial stability is further than ever before!

As Einstein has said, “Definition of Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

So instead of doing the same things over and over again, what can you do that is DIFFERENT?

First of all, be honest with yourself. Answer these questions:

• Have you known that you need to work harder on promotional strategies to get your name in front of patients that could afford your services but you have never step on the gas pedal fully and honestly?

• Are you depending only your insurance to bring you patients and depending on their timetable to pay you?

• Are you depending only on your patient base or referring doctors base to bring you patients?

• Are you engaging in 1 or 2 marketing campaigns like Yellow Pages or newspaper ads or just the internet and think that these are sufficient for your business to survive in a harsh economy?

• Are you telling yourself marketing is not important – treating patients well is ALL you need do ( despite all evidence that this is no longer enough)?

If you answer YES to any of these questions, then congratulations to your competitors, as you will have less and less exposure and visibility in your community and your competitors would be more than happy to see you reaching out less to potential patients.

Especially in a slow economy, the savvy doctor who is taking advantage of less doctors marketing in his area will STICK OUT through his marketing efforts.

The doctors and dentists who are working with the “UN-Advertising” approach are achieving large visibility at only a fraction of the cost.

Recently, a large medical publication DotMed News published our recommendations for health care professionals:

“[Un-advertising]…using other people’s effort and money to spread the word for you instead of only depending on your own resources of time and money which are limited…”

IMAGINE THIS: 

• What if you could reach out to at least 10,000-30,000 people in your area WITHOUT depending only on your own time and money?

• What if you could get A LARGE QUANTITY of WORD-OF-MOUTH from strangers – not just depending on your own patient pool?

• What if you could get more Fee for Service patients?

NOW YOU CAN!! 

Get a private Practice Owner Briefing by our top experts on how to increase qualified NEW PATIENTS and increase your bottom line despite the financial challenges.

This consultation and all information shared are confidential and are for Private Practice Owners ONLY:

If you are already doing well financially, congrats! But talk to us for more ideas on how to streamline your marketing budget – achieve more for less!

If you are not doing as well as you should financially, register right away for our briefing and set aside at least 87 minutes for this consultation:

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