Four months ago, I ventured into private practice, rented a small space in a city unknown to me. I was both excited and afraid then.
Patients came in trickles. I wait for them to come with a lot of patience. I remember my professor in health economics telling us when we were medical students, that the first year of practice is really the most difficult. That we will learn how to crochet, read pocketbooks, count cockroaches while waiting for patients. But, even if that is so, he was very strong in telling us to man the clinic as we promised ourselves and be there on schedule.
Now, those were very true statements. There were days when I spend all my clinic time toying with my laptop, or I count the number of lizards crawling if there were any or many times I bring my son so I can play with him. It's comforting though to think that at least I have tied up with the market cooperative, and drug companies never fail to offer free screening services so I get to promote myself. With that I get to pay my rent and earn a little. Sometimes i'd rather stay in my other clinics where I sure am busy attending to patients and forget about the time. Beginning a community practice is really different from the hospital where you get referrals and you see patients from HMO's.There is also the thrill of getting challenging and emergency cases from time to time.
And so today, while talking to my secretary who is a nursing undergrad (never finished her studies because of lack of financial resources ), I couldn't help but sigh at the amount of time I spend in my new space and wonder when will patients really come. It's not that i'm praying for them to get sick but the sedentary time is tiring for someone like me who wants to have work at hand all the time.
Patients came in trickles. I wait for them to come with a lot of patience. I remember my professor in health economics telling us when we were medical students, that the first year of practice is really the most difficult. That we will learn how to crochet, read pocketbooks, count cockroaches while waiting for patients. But, even if that is so, he was very strong in telling us to man the clinic as we promised ourselves and be there on schedule.
Now, those were very true statements. There were days when I spend all my clinic time toying with my laptop, or I count the number of lizards crawling if there were any or many times I bring my son so I can play with him. It's comforting though to think that at least I have tied up with the market cooperative, and drug companies never fail to offer free screening services so I get to promote myself. With that I get to pay my rent and earn a little. Sometimes i'd rather stay in my other clinics where I sure am busy attending to patients and forget about the time. Beginning a community practice is really different from the hospital where you get referrals and you see patients from HMO's.There is also the thrill of getting challenging and emergency cases from time to time.
And so today, while talking to my secretary who is a nursing undergrad (never finished her studies because of lack of financial resources ), I couldn't help but sigh at the amount of time I spend in my new space and wonder when will patients really come. It's not that i'm praying for them to get sick but the sedentary time is tiring for someone like me who wants to have work at hand all the time.
Well, I will keep on crossing my fingers, anyway my one year is not yet over, I still have 8 months to wait...and pray that I will have 'work' to do in my clinic.
1 comment:
goodluck che..
i feel the same way ..we kinda made photography a big hobby-small business venture. when it was just a hobby, it was really fun, the challenge to produce an outstanding image was inspired by sheer love of photography; after we 'invested' a bit of time, emotions, and some financial resources; the challenge was to produce images that will fulfill 'the art' , please the customer, and obtain hopefully a referral and increase in inquiry/business.
if you were 'busying' yourself fiddling with you laptop, we busied ourselves checking the number of gallery hits/domain visits; stalking visitors' and competition's blog sites; and continually learning how else we can improve our craft; i always say: " i will mark the moment when all our weekends are booked for the rest of the year=)"
again, goodluck to us=)
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