There's a New Yorker article detailing the commencement address Atul Gawande Atul Gawande delivered this commencement address, titled “Money,” to the graduates of the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine. It expands on the themes he touched on in his recent article about health-care costs in McAllen, Texas, which figured in President Obama’s speech on health care.
The text of this speech is available in this Medical Spa MD: best medical spas?
The political aspects of health care reform march on.
Not every doctor is qualified to perform every procedure. Do you really want to turn your body over to someone who doesn’t really know what they’re doing? Here are five questions you should ask before you get a cosmetic tweak from a doctor working outside of her specialty.
How many times have you done this procedure?
Ideally, you should hear “hundreds” or “thousands,” not “dozens” or something vague like “more than I can count.” Also ask the doc how long she’s been doing the procedure (less than a year means there’s still a learning curve) and how many times a week she does it (too few times a week means she’s less likely to have fresh product or offer you free touch-ups if you aren’t happy).
Do you own or rent your laser?
Renting may be a tip-off that the doctor isn’t doing the procedure often enough to make owning worth it. Rented lasers aren’t always calibrated correctly, which could mean an increased chance of a burn. Also, not every laser is suitable for every skin type, so be wary of the physician who has only one. Ask about the number of fillers being offered, too.
What muscle causes the lid to droop?
If a doctor can tell you it’s the levator muscle, then he probably knows enough facial anatomy to avoid or fix this problem that can result from a poorly placed Botox injection.
How did you learn how to do this procedure?
If the answer is, “I took courses,” ask: Who taught them? How long did they last? Look for the MD who has completed multiple courses and takes continuing-ed classes in the field. If she trained with a top plastic surgeon, ask, “How did you find time for that?” She may let it slip that the training only took one afternoon.
Will you be the one doing the procedure?
It doesn’t matter how many hours of training your gyno has in fillers if his assistant is the one shooting you up. If something goes wrong, you want to know that the med school grad is right there to manage the complications. Remember: You’re paying for the expertise of the best-trained person in that practice.
Of course you'll want to be somewhat circumspect when asking all of theses questions. You don't want an angry plastic surgeon performing your liposuction or boob job.
Here’s an overview of Active FX and some links to more information.
The goal of laser skin resurfacing is simple: replace damaged skin with new, fresh skin. Techniques for skin resurfacing have made enormous advances, allowing nearly everyone to achieve close to flawless complexions. Many systems allow for light, moderate or deep laser resurfacing. The primary targets of laser skin resurfacing include:
How it Works
The gold standard of laser resurfacing systems, the UltraPulse® CO2 laser delivers thousands of tiny laser pulses in a pattern over the skin. Each pulse heats a column of tissue eliminating pigment discolorations at the surface and creating a zone of heating deep in the tissue. Unique to the UltraPulse Encore, these zones of heating shrink collagen and tighten the skin immediately*. The CO2 laser also offers the benefits of heating deeper layers of skin tissue, thereby stimulating collagen remodeling, tightening* the skin further. Patients can select from a range of treatments depending on the needs of your skin and lifestyle.
What is ActiveFX “fractional” laser resurfacing?
ActiveFX is a fractional laser procedure performed in a single treatment with minimal patient downtime. During the procedure, a high-energy beam of laser light is used to smooth out lines, wrinkles and scars, remove brown spots and other irregularities, and tighten the skin. It also stimulates formation of new underlying collagen to continue improvement over time. With fractional laser treatment, only a fraction of the skin’s surface is treated by the laser, leaving small “bridges” of untouched skin. This technique makes the healing process much faster and enables you to get back to normal activities sooner.
Is ActiveFX right for you?
Treated areas should be washed twice a day with cool water and a mild soap. Use our lotion twice daily to treated areas for 3 to 5 days or until healing is complete. Treated areas should be protected from direct exposure to sunlight. Sunscreen with SPF greater than 15 should be used at all times on the treated areas.
ActiveFX is ideal for you if you:
What you can expect from ActiveFX
Most physicians perform the procedure in the office with a topical anesthetic cream that is applied 30-40 minutes before the ActiveFX procedure begins. There is little to no pain associated with the procedure – most patients say they feel warmth similar to sunburn. You can drive yourself home after the procedure. With a gentle washing and moisturizing regimen, your photodamaged skin will begin to flake off within 2 days. After about 3-5 days, your doctor will probably let you wear make-up. Pinkness should be gone in about a week.
ActiveFX treatment produces a dramatic effect on the skin:
The results of ActiveFX laser treatment are long-term and, with proper sun protection, can persist for many years. Most effects of treatment become visible right away, whereas others – such as new collagen formation, which leads to continued inner tightening – build up gradually and become more evident over time. Therefore, most people look even better 3-5 months after the procedure.
Additional Information on ActiveFX
http://www.aesthetic.lumenis.com/wt/page/activefx
http://www.lumenis.com/wt/page/pr_1170434066
http://www.skinandhealth.com/details/wrinkles_treatment#wrinkles_co2
Redness after IPL & Laser Treatments: DeepFX & ActiveFX
Reliant UltraPulse Fractional CO2 Laser
Active FX: Physician User Group ~ Medical Spa MD
Some fantastic info on Active FX laser resurfacing from Botox Patient. Love it.
In this article, I will give you several tips and tools to evaluate your laser centers culture and operations, so you can successfully navigate any economic downturn… And live to sell another day when the inevitable upturn comes around.
What is the Passion and Purpose of Your Medical Spa?
You reap what you sew. When you engage proactively and passionately in your business you will undoubtedly be successful and see your practice expand. It helps to articulate your passion for your medical spa.
At Assara Laser, our passion is to “help clients look and feel great, not fake.”
Why the Recession Drastically Affects Your Laser Clinics Bottom Line
You’ve probably noticed that generating revenue is not as easy as it once was. There are myriad reasons for this; from the decline in disposable income, to unemployment hitting record highs and tanking real estate valuations. As if these facts were not bleak enough, credit markets are virtually frozen so business owners are finding it nearly impossible to obtain small business loans and lines of credit. Refinancing current loans has become difficult for small businesses.
In short, we're operating in the perfect storm.
Accepting Reality and Responsibility Today
The easy way out is to close up shop and blame the recession. This will not help you going forward, it will not pay your devoted employees their wages, and most of all, it will not help your clients “look and feel great, not fake.” So, accept responsibility.
The hardships of the recession create a fact-pattern, problem to be solved; not a reason for failure. To paraphrase Michael Jackson, start, first, with the man in the mirror. Think about the following questions. And pay attention - there will be homework at the end of this article!
Finding Your Medspas Winning Competitive Difference?
Let’s be honest. The quality of your laser clinc's treatments are probably not drastically better than that of your competitors. The proprietary equipment and IPL or laser systems (Thermage, Fraxel, Titan) that you use are, for the most part, available to the competitive skin clinic market at large.
You may believe (and tell clients) that your microdermabrasion treatments are better because you use a diamond-tipped wand or aluminum oxide crystals. You may think that your IPLs or laser hair removal treatments are better because you use cryo-cooling or because you use chilled air cooling, or because you use a diode laser or because you use alexandrite lasers . . .
BUT . . .
Step in to your clients' shoes. To them, the bells and whistles of your Thermage or Fraxel device don't matter. Your clients already expect expert advice and cutting edge cosmetic lasers, IPLs and skin tighening equipment, so merely meeting this fundamental requirement is not a winning competitive difference.
What does matter to your clients are presentation, client interaction, customer service, reliability and consistency. Consider this carefully.
What is each of your medspas clients worth?
At Assara Laser, one of the most popular packages is our $449 per month Unlimited Laser Hair Removal Program. On average, a client that signs up for this program will remain a member of the Program for 7 months, depending on the results they wish to achieve. How much is a single unlimited client worth to us? A client in the program for 7 months, making a monthly payment of $449 is worth $3,143. For many laser clinic owners, a single laser hair removal client is worth more than a home mortgage payment!
Do you treat every single potential laser treatment client that contacts your laser clinic as if they’re worth $3,000?
What is your time and effort worth?
Before my partners and I built Assara Laser, I was an attorney. I still practice corporate law as a labor of love, when a friend or business contact has an exciting deal. I normally discount my rate to about $400 per hour, as law isn’t my primary source of income.
Assume an hour of your time is worth $400. Assume further that, every time your customers complain, you are willing to give a discount, or a free treatment and that, collectively, free and discounted treatments account for a 20% loss in your revenue. To make up for this lost revenue, how much more work do you have to do?
Well, let’s add 20% to your 10 hour day, which now makes it a 12 hour day. If your annual sales are say $1,000,000 per year, you’ve lost $200,000. This translates into 500 hours more of work you must do to bring your revenue back to status quo!
Is there a big difference between a day that starts at 9:00 a.m. and ends at 7:00 p.m. versus ending at 9:00 p.m. You betcha there is! Is there a big difference between a loss of $200,000 and a loss of zero. You betcha there is! And these differences drastically affect your quality of life.
How Do You Avoid Mistakes?
Mistakes are costly. A happy client is worth more than $3,000, and will likely refer business, the best and cheapest form of marketing. A single angry client will result in you working 2 hours more per day for the following seven work days, and will possibly diminish your reputation by badmouthing your medspa.
A lot of people think excellent customer service means free treatments. It doesn’t. Excellent customer service means delivering what you promise. You know the limitations and effectiveness of your treatments so promise only what you can deliver and do it consistently, with a smile on your face!
Medical Spa MD today announced that it has selected Sendside Networks as it's exclusive member communication platform. A secure replacement to email, Sendside offers a 1:1 secure sales communication platform that offers high touch interactive messaging and real-time reporting and control for mission-critical communications in a secure environment.
"Sendside is the only solution that addresses our need to communicate easily but still allows us to protect confidential information," said Jeff Barson, Editor of Medical Spa MD.
"Unlike any other technology, Sendside gives us the ability to send interactive tabbed messages that allow recipients to fill out forms and actually make purchases 'inside' the message, without being redirected to an external link from an email. This gives us the ability to actually send the entire Medical Spa MD site directly through a message while retaining control and accessing all of Sendside's analytics and real time reporting.
For the first time we can see exactly who has read a message, downloaded and attachment, or forwarded a message to a collegue, providing us with an inside look at what a recipient is doing and offering a perfect opportunity of knowing when to send follow-up information.
The cost to create and send this type of content would be cost prohibitive using any other solution.
Best of all, it's free for the recipient and as easy to use as web based email."
Medical Spa MD is currently using Sendside to communicate with thousands of plastic surgeons, dermatologist, and cosmetic physician members around the world.
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ABOUT SENDSIDE NETWORKS, INC.
Utah-based Sendside® Networks, Inc. has developed Sendside—the 1 to 1 Sales Communication Platform that provides organizations a secure, interactive communications channel directly to their customers, prospective customers, clients and investors. Sendside combines secure, interactive messaging with file delivery, interactive forms, e-signatures, payments, and secure storage into a comprehensive communication and interaction platform unlike anything on the market today. Sendside currently has fifteen U.S. Patents pending including Sendside Markup Language (SML), Behavior-based Messaging (BBM), Multi-dimensional Messaging (MDM), Sendside eSign, on demand messaging, embedded payments and acknowledgement. www.sendside.com
ABOUT MEDICAL SPA MD
Medical Spa MD is a community of Plastic Surgeons, Dermatologists, Aesthetic Physicians, and Medical Spa Professionals. Medspa MD has Blogs, Forums, and Classified advertising. Members include 2,000+ members worldwide and medicalspa.com recieves more than 100,000 page views each month from physicians and individulals looking for informaton about cosmetic medicine and the lates advances in non-surgical technology.
Medical Spa MD has been chosen by MAPA - The Medical Aesthetic Practice Association as the exclusive technology platform for MAPA Members.
“This is a great day for MAPA”, explained Dr. Epstein. “Medical Spa MD has been a pioneer in information exchange within the cosmetic medical field for years now. His MedicalSpaMD.com Internet Website & Blog has already advance our knowledge by quantum leaps. Combining our manpower, our experience and our content with his robust internet platform will take us even further.”
The Medical Aesthetic Practice Association was formed in response to a need for information sharing in the Medical Aesthetic Practice area. The Medical Aesthetic Practice Association (MAPA) is THE Clinical and Business Information Exchange Forum for Aesthetic Medical Practices and their business and clinical staff.
Jeffrey E. Epstein, MD, MAPA’s founder and Executive Director explained the need and the purpose of MAPA, “the Medical Aesthetic Practice Association’s purpose is to promote and facilitate information exchange among Medical Aesthetic Practices. By sharing our ideas, experiences, opinions and insights, we can learn faster and benefit from each other’s successes and failures. In order to facilitate the convenient and high volume exchange of advanced business and clinical information, MAPA provides Internet Based Platforms for Medical Aesthetic Practice Owners and their Clinical Staff. MAPA also hosts live discussions in their Chat Rooms on a regular basis to promote real-time discussion about important, topical issues.”
MAPA & MSMD will soon have in excess of 2000 (two thousand) members. MAPA currently has Fifty Diamond Club Members who produce content and manage daily activities.
MAPA is planning on hosting their third clinical exchange meeting this Spring at the Cherry Hill Physician Training and Research Center. The meeting held in November 2008 was a huge success. There is no cost to attend these meetings. MAPA will also be meeting at this years ASLMS Conference in Baltimore, MD the first week in April.
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ABOUT MAPA
The Medical Aesthetic Practice Association’s purpose is to promote and facilitate information exchange among Medical Aesthetic Practices. By sharing our ideas, experiences, opinions and insights, we can learn faster and benefit from each other’s successes and failures. In order to facilitate the convenient and high volume exchange of advanced business and clinical information, MAPA provides Internet Based Platforms for Medical Aesthetic Practice Owners and their Clinical Staff. MAPA hosts live discussions in their Chat Rooms on a regular basis to promote real-time discussion about important, topical issues.
ABOUT MEDICAL SPA MD
Medical Spa MD is a community of Plastic Surgeons, Dermatologists, Aesthetic Physicians, and Medical Spa Professionals. Medspa MD has Blogs, Forums, and Classified advertising. Members include 2,000+ members worldwide and medicalspa.com recieves more than 100,000 page views each month from physicians and individulals looking for informaton about cosmetic medicine and the lates advances in non-surgical technology.
If you're a plastic surgeon or dermatologist starting a medical spa, skin clinic, or laser center, you'll need to have all of your ducks in a row.
Here are 9 tips to keep your medspa in the black, and your laser treatments and Botox appointments full.
1. Have sufficient funds to kee your Medical Spa open for months.
Don’t even think about opening a Medical Spa unless you have the capital needed to bring it through the startup and first year of operation. Invariably, your planning will not deal with all of the unforeseen issues that can occur in the MedSpa industry. From regulatory compliance changes and training costs, to increased marketing costs. Under-capitalization is a leading indicator of business failure. You should considering a combination of various financing strategies from leasing to working capital.
2. Talk with other doctors who have successful, operating Medical Spas
Ask them what they would do the same, and what they would do differently. We are starting to see some established Medical Spas out there, try and learn from their experiences and best practices.
3. Join associations that help new Medical Spas succeed
They are a great source of experienced MedSpa owners, who have already gone through what you will. In addition, they often have members who have specialized in the MedSpa industry, including: business planning, marketing, design, dealing with regulatory issues, insurance and finance. The International Medical Spa Association even has a mentorship program that is available for new MedSpa owners. It is invaluable to chat with someone across the country who has had the same problems you may have, especially if you know they are not a local competitor!
4. Know your strengths and weaknesses
No one is strong in all areas, you may be an expert in age management medicine, but you may be weak on the business and marketing side. That’s fine, but you are going to need to identify the areas where you are weak and compensate. Not all areas require a permanent, full-time employee, you may consider hiring a consultant who has the necessary experience.
5. Watch your medical spa's monthly expenses
Especially during the startup phase of a MedSpa, it can be easy to see the glamour of having marble flooring, but is it really necessary? You may be better off adding another hair removal treatment room, which will generate income. Remember the old adage: “it will take twice as long and cost twice as much as you anticipated.”
6. Determine what need your Medical Spa meets.
As with any successful business, you need to meet a consumer demand. With 11,500 people joining the over 50 crowd every day, you have a great potential market. But you need to make sure you are where they can be found (i.e. medical centers, shopping centers, established communities).
7. Know your laser clinic's monthly cash flow.
You may think financial statements are only for accountants to understand, but you need to be able to read some key financial statements. Including the cash flow statement, this lets you know where the money is coming from and where it is going. You must always know your current cash flow situation, if you cannot pay your bills, you are effectively out of business. Botox, Restylane, Juvederm, IPL, cosmetic lasers... they're all expensive.
8. Open your medical spa because you want to.
Starting a MedSpa is going to consume two things: time and money. The profit potential of a MedSpa is huge, but if you are not doing what you really enjoy, it will show on your bottom-line! As you will probably be spending more time and money than you originally planned, you need to make sure operating a Medical Spa is what you really want to do.
9. Don’t hire family and friends
They may be able to provide you with valuable assistance during the startup phase, but they most likely will not be able to get you to that next level. This is where having an experienced MedSpa director is very important. Not only are they going to hire and train your employees, but they also will be responsible for the day-to-day operations of the MedSpa. Hiring a competent MedSpa Director can allow you to run your MedSpa as a stand alone profit center; one that makes money whether you are there or not.
Is click fraud costing your laser center or medical spa and driving up your prices? If you’re one of the tens of thousands of cosmetic medical practices, laser clinics and med spas advertising online with Google Adwords or Yahoo, don’t be surprised to find that at least some of the money you’re paying every month is sucked out of your marketing fund by click fraud.
The practice of “click fraud” began in the early days of the Internet’s popularity with software programs that automatically surfed Web sites to increase traffic figures. This led companies to develop policing technologies touted as antidotes to the problem. (Some marketing executives estimate that up to 20 percent of fees in certain advertising categories continue to be based on nonexistent consumers in today’s search industry.)
Don’t think it’s already happening to your skin clinic, med spa or laser clinic? Here’s a recent quote from Michael Caruso, CEO of click fraud services vendor ClickFacts in an interview:
“In particularly fraud prone verticals such as finance, class action lawsuits and medical, we see click fraud rates in the 30-45 percent range. These are all categories that see high keyword pricing in the auction model. That makes them particularly tasty for click fraud artists. “If you can make more money from the dark side than the light side of search, there are plenty of people who will take advantage. Plus, it’s not even technically illegal yet.”
There are two main ways that your skin clinics and medical spas marketing budget is being drained by click fraud:
First, your medical spas and laser clinics competitors who see your ad are simply clicking on it, draining your marketing budget and costing you advertising dollars. Second, fraudsters set up ‘affiliate sites’ that run skin clinics ads where they are clicked on by bots or employees. (These sites are the most damaging since you’re paying for every click without any return at all. Click fraud around skin clinics, med spas or laser clinics can be very lucrative since dermatology or plastic surgery clinics are becoming such a competitive market and the payment per click can be as high as $4-6.)
Unfortunately, to keep your laser centers budget safe you have very few tools. (Google just gave advertisers $90 million to compensate for click fraud as the result of a class action suit but you can bet they’re not that Google’s not interested in your individual account. Especially since they’re making money from click fraud when your ads are clicked on.)
Start by limiting your laser centers exposure. If your dermatology or plastic surgery clinic is still running an Adwords or Yahoo campaign, they allow you to limit the maximum amount you spend in a day. Take advantage of this feature by limiting your maximum cost to what you can afford to spend. You can also look for the tracks of click fraud by examining the reports you might have available to you. Multiple clicks coming from the same IP address are a sure sign of fraud. (Malaysia has become such a haven for click fraud around medspas and IPL laser treatments.)
If you’re going to run ppc ads, protect your laser center, med spa or laser clinic. You can be sure that you’re the only one trying to.
