PRACTICE MANAGEMENT
Doctorpreneurs Incubator hatches physician businesses BY CRYSTAL ZUZEK Jake
Childers, MD, an Austin Regional Clinic (ARC) fam- ily physician, found out he had rheumatoid arthri- tis about eight years ago. Rather than letting his ill- ness derail him, he was inspired by his experience with treating and manag- ing his disease to start a business.
After learning he had
rheumatoid arthritis during his residency, Dr. Childers took an active role in co- managing his illness with his rheumatologist and be- came an expert in the dis- ease. He says he read every rheumatology journal and article available and con- stantly looked for insight into his disease and its ef- fects on his body.
“I embraced outside-the-
box thinking in pursuit of an outlier outcome. It turns out that many of my treat- ment decisions were, in es- sence, seven-year leading indicators on how early rheumatoid arthritis is cur- rently managed,” he said. This knowledge and his remission inspired him to found n=you, LLC, an online platform that allows physicians to share information about how they’re managing their own chronic conditions. Providing powerful research tools, disease tracking, and contact with a physician community of colleagues, n=you allows for analysis of outlier outcomes while generating novel insights into disease treatment and management. From his diagnosis to his remission, Dr. Childers continu-
ally examined his unique experience in managing his rheumatoid arthritis. “I wondered what could be learned from others who battled their diseases with the same scientific knowledge and advantag- es I had,” he said. This curiosity inspired him to develop n=you, with the belief that other physicians should also have the opportunity to advance disease under- standing in search of out- lier outcomes. Dr. Childers says he needs physicians with chronic conditions to register to use n=you at
www.nequalsyou.com. “Initially, my focus is
Jake Childers, MD, is executive director of the Walters Physician Incubator, a new venture designed to help physician entrepreneurs advance their business ideas.
reaching physicians in Texas. Eventually, I’d like physicians across the United States and all over the world to sign up and participate. By studying a small number of sophis- ticated people in depth, I hope to find pearls of wis- dom for disease treatment and management that can be extrapolated across a
larger patient population,” he said. The website is currently set up for physicians with rheuma- toid arthritis, but Dr. Childers says the system can accommo- date users with other diseases. “The infrastructure has been built to adapt to other disease information. If we get a group of physician users with Parkin- son’s disease, for instance, we can easily tweak the platform for them,” he said.
September 2013 TEXAS MEDICINE 47
JIM LINCOLN
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