I’ve reached a milestone: after three years, my startup has reached breakeven. For the first time, I’m not living hand-to-mouth.
So I’m now able to have my first little office outside the home. I can go to work, and I can come home from work. See sign at right: my name, and my motto, “Let Patients Help.” I’ve hung out my shingle.
Thank you, clients and sponsors.
Words can barely express my gratitude to the people who helped me get started, through their early support when nobody had ever heard of me, and as far as I know nobody ever paid to hear a patient speak at a conference.
Who was first to offer me pay for a speech? Kent Bottles MD (@KentBottles), who at the time was president of ICSI, the Institute for Clinical Systems Improvement in the Twin Cities. And before that, the first to invite a keynote was Gunter Eysenbach MD (@Eysenbach) of Medicine 2.0. It was unpaid, but it was a genuine “patient gives keynote” invitation – the opening keynote of his 2009 event. Imagine – a patient opening an academic medical conference.
And it’s no coincidence that those two docs were on Twitter back then, four years ago. Vision is vision, and action is action.
If I’d known then what it would take…
Three years of hand-to-mouth… in the first year I blogged about the business of patient engagement. (If you haven’t read that, please do – it explains my method and what it took to do this.)
If I’d known then what I was getting into … well, I probably would have done it anyway: I felt the calling.
But this has not been easy. Having my head above water is just plain strange. But wonderful. And that’s why I’m so, so, so grateful to those who saw the future and helped me get started, and those who’ve supported me as my prices have risen. I work hard to deliver value – not in my eyes, but in my customers’ – and it’s really gratifying to see that the industry sees value in the patient perspective.
Outstanding! Congratulations, Dave.
Congratulations, Dave!! I take a lot of hope from your work, and the growth of your brand. Long may you wave, brother.
Fab, fab, fabUlous. Congratulations!
Very proud of you, sir!
Congratulations!
Congrats! You are leading the way for all of us to better empowered patients and to advocate for others to do the same. I appreciate all you do…
AnneMarie
Congratulations Dave I’m sure this will help give lots of other Patients more confidence in the value they can add as a result of their experiences.
I look forward to the next stage when a client of yours shares details surrounding the transformation that happened (and of course the ROI!) when they started letting Patient’s help…
TOTAL congratulations Dave, and exceedingly well deserved.
Your calling carries you and you can trust it. So wonderful, Sir Dave.
Congratulations! I”m sure that’s a great feeling!!
Congratulations on the progress on your business. What you are doing is very important! I thought about your work the other day, when the doctor’s office called and cancelled my appointment because the lab values precluded treatment. I told them I needed the appointment to discuss what was going on, rather than just putting it off–and I could show them how the data from two different clinical systems demonstrated that the trend was clearly downward.
You are making a difference!
THAT is a very rewarding thing to hear – thanks!
You deserve the gratitude of millions who share the same vision of inspiring patient empowerment but not motivated or talented to motivate others. Bless you from a physician, patient advocate, and friend.
You. Are. Awesome. Congrats!
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