The Doctors Journey to Entrepreneurship with the Founder of Magnolia Direct Family Care, Dr. Audra Cook

In this episode, Chris is joined by Dr. Audra Cook - Founder of Magnolia Direct Family Care - an Oklahoma based primary care provider that’s on a mission to make healthcare accessible to all. Dr. Cook knew she wanted to be a doctor from the time when she was a little girl. She experimented with studying art and psychology until a professor that she met along the way helped steer her back to her initial path - and the rest was history. The decision to found Magnolia Direct Family Care came from Dr. Cook’s journey as a primary care physician. At one point she had over 4000 patients under her purview and she felt she was being stretched thin with the rushed nature of larger health systems. The reason why she became a doctor was always to provide the best possible care for her patients, and with the workload of larger health organizations she knew it was impossible to give her best to her patients, so she made the decision to go out on her own and do things the right way. The impact of a truly excellent healthcare provider that has the bandwidth to fix causes instead of just treating symptoms cannot be overstated. Dr. Cook mentions that when working at a large health conglomerate, she would have 3 staff members that would filter the calls and try to solve the needs of the patient without having the knowledge and individual understanding about the patient, causing information gaps and overall decreasing the quality of service that was provided. Dr. Cook and Chris speak on the cultural changes between independent physicians and those who work for large health complexes. There’s been a huge shift in where physicians practice now compared to previous decades. Back when Dr. Cook was in school almost 20 years ago, 80% of primary care physicians were self-employed and ran their own practices, while though aggressive acquisition strategies now only 20% are self-employed, while the majority work for large health complexes. Even though the level of care that can be provided by an individual practice is much higher than what you can expect at a large healthcare organization, it’s still no easy task getting people through the door. Dr. Cook mentions that she’s not a self promoter at all. Luckily about 10% of her patients from before were retained as patients of her private practice, and from there she’s seen word of mouth as the strongest marketing tool - which is really no surprise given how much care she has for her patients. Check out the full episode to learn more on the doctor's journey to entrepreneurship! Connect with Dr. Audra Cook - https://www.magnoliadirectfamilycare.com/ Connect with Chris - https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-hopfer/ Don't be a stranger! If you have a guest in mind you'd love to hear on the show, or a burning question you'd love answered - reach out to the executive producer Ed via email - [email protected] - and we will take a look and see if we can make your day!