Courage to Find What Matters with Solo Doctor Dr. William Tancredi

Have you ever had trouble finding where you fit in? Or maybe found it difficult to be yourself? I have and so has our guest today. Our guest is Dr. Bill Tancredi. We met at VMX this year as we were both invited to a small dinner that Instinct Science put together. And we’ve become really good friends. If you know of Bill’s writing in his SubStack called Doc’s FIRE, you may find him a little ... direct in his writing style.  But Bill and I get along so well because we love to learn, love the veterinary profession, and both strive to do things that matter in this world. 

No matter the challenges we face including people who disagree with us or finding a place where we fit in, when you find the thing worth fighting for, you find your purpose. Now, Bill owns a solo doctor practice, which also won a NAVC Vetty award last year, which he shares how they achieved. In this episode, we talk about finding your authentic self and how there’s no such thing as a one-fits-all leadership style. 

Resources:

• Episode on YouTube
• Doc's FIRE: Facts, Insights, Research, Education
• Admired Leadership
• Gift guide for veterinary people

Transcript

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William Tancredi

Megan Sprinkle: [00:00:00] Welcome to VetLife Reimagined. Have you ever had trouble finding where you fit in, or maybe found it difficult to be yourself? I have, and so has our guest today. Our guest is Bill Tancredi. We met at VMX this year as we were both invited to a small dinner that Instinct Science put together, and we've become really good friends.

Megan Sprinkle: If you know Bill's writing and his substack called Doc's FIRE, you may find him a little controversial. He himself called himself. But Bill and I get along so well because we both love to learn. Love the veterinary profession and both strive to do things that matter in this world. No matter the challenges we face, including people who disagree with us or finding a place where we fit in, when you find the thing that's worth fighting for, you find your purpose.

Megan Sprinkle: Now, Bill owns a solo doctor practice, which also won an NAVC Vetty Award last year, which he shares how they achieved. 

Megan Sprinkle: In this episode, we talk about finding your authentic self and how there's no such thing as a one size fits all leadership [00:01:00] style. So let's get to the conversation with Dr. William Rey.

Megan Sprinkle: when did you know that you wanted to get into veterinary medicine? 

William Tancredi: I was in college. I was an undergraduate student and I thought it seemed like a good idea and it seemed like a fun profession and I knew nothing and I'm really lucky that, the dumb 20 year old version of myself made a good decision and stumbled across a career I really love, but, it wasn't a lifelong passion. It wasn't a very well informed idea, but I really lucked out.

Megan Sprinkle: I could definitely tell it's a passion now, which I love, and I'm excited to get to. I mean, did you see it in a book? Did you see a cute girl who was going to the classes? What was it? 

William Tancredi: I was, I don't really remember. I, yeah. I think I liked the idea of medicine. I was an English major who decided that was probably not going to get me an actual job. The idea of being a lawyer sounded terrible. , [00:02:00] Being a doctor sounded cool, but doing a residency didn't, , respect to our specialists. Cause that doesn't look like a ton of fun. And Vet med was a little more accessible.

William Tancredi: there was an animal shelter down the street that let me walk dogs as much as I wanted. And I pursued the interest without really knowing any better. It was probably a terrible way to make a decision, but it worked out. Sometimes it's a leap of faith, though. It was, yeah. 

Megan Sprinkle: What was, I mean, you said you, there was an animal shelter down the street, but when you heard veterinarian, what was the picture that you thought about that you went into vet school with?

William Tancredi: I wanted to do something that mattered. And I still feel that way that like, this is a job that what we do matters.  you make the world just a little tiny bit better one patient at a time, if you're doing your job right. And that was all I really needed. You know, everybody likes

William Tancredi: [00:03:00] to feel useful, useful in a good way to leave things better than I found them. I feel like life's been good to me. So The least I can do it's like a kind of an obligation It's a little churlish to do anything but give back and , I really feel like I this lets me give and do for others 

Megan Sprinkle: now Vet school is not easy, so I’m sure there were moments where you were not 100 inspired in vet school But how was your vet school years?

William Tancredi: I hated vet school and it's nobody's fault but mine. I really didn't enjoy it at all. I, went to St. George's, and I'm old enough that the communication back then wasn't that good. And so it was hard to get through. It was hard to be away from family.

William Tancredi: It was hard to be away from friends. It was very isolating and, I didn't do very well. didn't do much to take care of my mental health, [00:04:00] and I suffered for it, and the university I attended, I don't know that they did a great job helping, but I don't think it was their responsibility to do that, either. I didn't do a good job taking care of myself, and I suffered for it. Fortunately, it was only four years, and then off you go, and as soon as I started doing the job, it felt better as soon as I started.

William Tancredi: Actually, my fourth year felt a lot better because it felt more like doing something. And thank goodness for that. 

Megan Sprinkle: Did you have to go to other universities for your clinical years? 

William Tancredi: I did. I attended St. George's for my first three years, and then I went to the University of Illinois for my clinical rotations. And Illinois was great. Midwesterners are the nicest people. they were very welcoming.  The program was good. The professors were good. seems like they give their students a really good education.  a lot of the professors and residents seem to actively care 

[00:05:00] about what they do and want to do a good job and do right by the students and they care about teaching. And it showed.

Megan Sprinkle: Now, did you start to understand you wanted to do small animal medicine during clinics or when? 

William Tancredi: Yeah, well. it was kind of during the recession that we were in veterinary school and I thought I wanted to be a horse vet, but then there weren't any horses anymore. There were a third as many thoroughbreds being bred, way fewer standard breads.

William Tancredi: And you were hearing stories of surgeons and internists working as GPs because there was no other work. It was like, yeah, I should probably figure out how to do this dog and cat thing. And. It worked out. I really love my job. I think I would be a terrible horse vet.  And I really like doing the medicine that you get to do as a small animal practitioner.

Megan Sprinkle: Yeah, that's a little bit different than like thoroughbred racing. It looks very intense to me. 

William Tancredi: Yeah, almost none of my patients outweigh me anymore. Like this is, [00:06:00] this is an easier life. Like there's air conditioning, 

Megan Sprinkle: Now, I can't say that all of the patients, I would outweigh, but I'm a very petite person. So 

William Tancredi: we've met in person. I'm, I'm at least twice your size. 

Megan Sprinkle: I actually remember this one dog, very obese. This was an internship. So this is before I was in a nutrition residency.

This dog weighed 200 something pounds. He looked like a little walrus in the kennel. So you get back and you get into practice and it sounds like, okay, this is better. This is more of what I was expecting. So I think,our first year out of school is kind of a discovery stage. What were you discovering about yourself and just the role of veterinarian?

William Tancredi: I love the job.  Without going into unkind details about some of the situations I was in my first few years as a veterinarian, I didn't have a lot of leadership or mentorship. But I did have the good 

[00:07:00] fortune to work in hospitals that were practicing good medicine, so I'm grateful for that.

William Tancredi: And I think those, you know, bad situations and those, bad fit situations and bad leaders or bad bosses really made me care about how to run it, how to lead people well. How to care about people, how to get good outcomes, it made me conscious of the importance of fit in a job.

William Tancredi: And that really shaped a lot of my learning afterwards. And I'm grateful for that. Cause I think I'm better off for having experience bad things in a way that didn't leave lasting damage, but it made me care about, wow, leadership is important.

William Tancredi: Management is important. And I think those are two different things. Fit is really important. And not everybody fits in everywhere and that's okay.  You can be a great doctor, you can be a great technician and go to a great hospital and it could be a bad fit. 

[00:08:00] And, that's okay. you got to find where you fit.  It probably says a lot about my erasable grouchy self that I now run my own practice. Like I ran out of trying to fit in places and just started my own. We're not a terribly diverse profession, but in terms of background and thought we can be, and I think we should acknowledge that and there can be great hospitals that look very different.

William Tancredi: There can be great doctors that practice very differently. And, we're not interchangeable. 

Megan Sprinkle:  I think that's, very good insights because you have to ask yourself these questions too. And you have to give yourself some grace, give other people grace. 

Right? It's trying to find your place where you can thrive, and do what you want to do. You want to do to make the difference in the impact. Yeah. So I'm curious then with that background and you said you, you started your own practice back in your hometown as well. Yeah. How do you go about when it comes to hiring 

[00:09:00] people?  I'm sure those are things that you think about trying to also find people who fit in your clinic. So how do you go about that? 

William Tancredi: you're kind of always hiring. you're always looking for the right person. You don't treat team dynamics or leadership is like a homework assignment that's accomplished and set aside. You gotta keep your eyes on it. You gotta pay attention. You gotta be interested in people. You gotta be curious about people, and I'll diverge, a second to make this compliment, but I think you like you have this gift of curiosity about people.

William Tancredi: You're really good at it.  You interview people who are famous and well known in our profession and people who are not, and you've gotten, you know, great stories because of it. And I think one of the secrets for my hiring success has been being open to people from outside the profession, people with no experience, you know, I can teach people to place a catheter or hold a dog.

[00:10:00] William Tancredi: I can't really teach them to be a nice person or to care or to be funny.  It's always a work in progress. it's not something to be done. It's something to be cultivated and grown and managed and led over time. It's never finished. 

Megan Sprinkle:  Yeah, and I think going back to your tip of being curious about people, I think that's a great leadership tip too, because I think sometimes when we have problems as leaders or in leadership, or when we assume too much, so when you can stay curious about people and are listening and asking questions, genuinely curious about them, I think you kind of find a lot of your answers, but are there other ways that you can help learn more about leadership or you're sound like a pretty avid reader. So I don't know if leadership books are among those things.

William Tancredi: They are. There's some other leadership resources out there that are good. A little known one that I recommend to everybody is called admired [00:11:00] leadership. They have a free newsletter that.

William Tancredi: Is a fantastic read on sub stack. comes out at 7am Eastern every day. Maybe a five minute read, but I learned through books. I learned through podcasts. I learned by just being curious about the world. sometimes I learned from leaders who have a lot to say about what made them successful, and sometimes I have a lot to learn from disaster stories. Reading about Theranos or Uber or stuff that really went very poorly. Enron. There's stuff to learn everywhere.

William Tancredi: We've talked about sports before we got on here, and there's stuff to learn in sports and there's stuff to learn in history and there's metaphor and analogy, and I'm a sucker for a good story. There's stories everywhere. 

Megan Sprinkle:  And I think we as human beings crave it as well. We just might take it slightly differently. Some people really like movies and YouTube, but I think finding that human story is, is very special. Yeah. And I'm kind 

[00:12:00] of partial, but I think we have a lot of wonderful stories in veterinary medicine. So that's why I do this. But this is something I've not experienced in, and that is being a solo practitioner. And I say, I say, I haven't experienced it. I have been. in situations where I feel alone, but I'm technically not alone. So, this is a little bit different that you're a solo practitioner, and I don't know how big your town is.

I don't know how often you run into a veterinarian to talk to, but what do you like about it and what are some challenges of being a solo practitioner? 

William Tancredi: I think what I like and the challenges are the same. You have all of the responsibility, you have all of the credit, you have all of the blame, you have all of the success. And think that's a worthy burden. That's something that I am privileged and honored to take on 

[00:13:00] for people. I don't really consider my clients, but my neighbors, and these people aren't just clients that I might run into someplace. Like these are people who have known me most of my life.

William Tancredi: went to school with my little sister. They babysat my cousin. They worked with my mom. They are good friends with my dad.  There's a big responsibility to what we do. And to work hard to be a good clinician is another thing that is always a work in progress is always something you work to be better at and to do well.

William Tancredi: It's one of the things that has driven me to, you know, pursue the AI technology and implement it into the practice and look into other forms of technology and other ways of monitoring pets and just to try to do a better job. And they don't all work. Some don't work, some things fall flat.

William Tancredi: I tell my clients that, but we always try to get better. 

Megan Sprinkle:  and that's one thing that I love about your story 

[00:14:00] and to me is very interesting is: solo practitioner in your hometown. I think I even heard that the clinic where you work now, wasn't it like an old hobby shop or something?

William Tancredi: Yeah. Yeah. The office I'm sitting in my office in my clinic was a storefront. That was a hobby shop where yours truly spent his allowance on matchbox cars and toy trains. Yeah 20, 30 years ago. So, I think about that all the time and I think about, how lucky I am to get to do this. 

Megan Sprinkle:  Yeah. I mean, talk about building relationships.

You know, I just had a conversation about the importance of building relationships and it could be. In a business capacity, like a startup company where a relationship that you built a long time ago and you didn't burn bridges can be extremely successful later on. But even coming down to building really special relationships with your clients and.

That's hard because there's a thing that they say where it's really hard to be a [00:15:00] profit in your own hometown or something like that. So, I mean, if they remember changing your diaper, it might be kind of hard to like, say, yes, thank you for those times, but I need you to do this for fluffy.

William Tancredi: Yeah. So yeah, it does change the dynamic. there's a difference between, Bill, and Dr. Tancredi. And it's usually not too hard to navigate, but every once in a while, it's like, no, this isn't the advice of the high school kid you used to know. This is the advice of a guy who's been a doctor for a decade.

William Tancredi: I'm not making this up. It's not a cute idea. Here's the paper we hold up. Here's the reason we're doing this. I say we play with live ammo around here. Like the stuff we do matters. So if you don't take it seriously, if you don't work hard at it, and if you can't get it done, there are real consequences.

Megan Sprinkle:  Yeah. And again, going back to being the only veterinarian in the building, you really have that responsibility to take on the learning, to know 

[00:16:00] how to make things better, and you do that extremely well.  You're very well informed. You study this a lot. And of course you write about it too. So, was there like a moment or a couple of moments that kind of built up to that?

Okay. I think I'm going to start writing. And if “blog” is offensive, I don't know if blog is 

William Tancredi: It's kind of got a pejorative tone to it, doesn't it? 

Megan Sprinkle:  I know I was like, I don't know Is that like a cool word anymore blog used to be a really cool word, but I don't know if it is anymore Substack means like a big thing.

William Tancredi: So it sounds better, right? I don't know why but newsletter is like, oh, what's a newsletter? Um, no, I, I started writing about a year ago. I tried to write for some of the industry publications and I was rejected. And admittedly, probably rightfully, because I wasn't writing very well because I was writing for other people and I was trying to appeal to the masses.

William Tancredi: And. Not everybody's cup of tea. I'm intense. I'm difficult. [00:17:00] I'm headstrong and I have a sledgehammer direct style of communication and that's not for everybody. But I talked to someone who was a writing coach and a friend of mine and she said, well, just lean into it. Be that, grouchy, hard ass pain in the ass person.

William Tancredi: At least it's authentic. And it took me a minute to like summon the courage to be disliked, but I'm really glad I did, and I've definitely bothered people with some of the stuff I've written, but I stand by it, and I'm proud of what I've done, and writing for me is like podcasting for you.

William Tancredi: It's a bit like when they asked Frank Sinatra, like, when are you going to stop singing? And he's like, I don't sing for money. I don't sing because it's a profession. I sing because I'm a singer. It's what I do. It's who I am. 

[00:18:00] And writing's been that gift to me because I don't know how I'd enter the world without that.

Megan Sprinkle:  Now, when you majored in English, way before thoughts of vet school, was writing also something you really enjoyed doing? 

William Tancredi: It was. And I wasn't very good at it. I think mostly because I was trying to write for somebody else. I was trying to write. What somebody else wanted me to write. And I'm just not very good at that.

I'm not a very good mimic.  to copy someone else's style or to fit it in somebody else's box is hard for me.  I am grateful for like the chance to write a sub stack and have an outlet for it.

William Tancredi: I really don't know. What I would do without it, I'd probably be writing. I'd just be scribbles and notebooks. 

Megan Sprinkle:  And what a shame ‘cause then we wouldn't get to read it. And I think this is important because I'm trying to think back and I probably was good at writing what people wanted to hear.

Megan Sprinkle:  And I think that's why I got good grades. 

[00:19:00] However, you can't find yourself that way. Luckily, I was still a very curious person and I thought and dreamed a lot. So I could still, I did that afterwards, but it's freeing when you can feel like you can be yourself and just explore who you are and the things that matter to you.

So I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing to be bad at it because you, hopefully it encourages you faster to, you know, to be the authentic human being that you are and find your place. Cause again, the faster you can find that, I think the faster you can find your fit back to that example, right. And really start to thrive in what you want to do.

If you don't know who you are, you're going to have all of the time, trying to figure out where you fit. Yeah. you talked about being a very direct. Writer. And so I know you write a lot 

[00:20:00] Megan Sprinkle:  about AI, especially in veterinary medicine, but I've been very curious to hear your response to this. What topic have you written on that you realize how vast the opinions are? 

William Tancredi: I think probably leadership. Everybody's got an opinion about leadership. Yeah. Yeah. And you know there's really famous, like leadership gurus who haven't really ever led anything, and it's not based on research.

William Tancredi: It's based on their ideas and their philosophy and everything else. And I feel that, because it's so easy to write about leadership, so easy to have an opinion about leadership and hard to find good research on leadership, it ends up being a very noisy place and I think leaders are just the rest of us.

William Tancredi: Like you can have a veterinarian who doesn't fit, you can have a leader who doesn't fit. We just watched the Superbowl. If you asked Andy Reid to run an animal hospital, I bet he'd 

[00:21:00] be bad at it. but you know, he's one of the great NFL coaches of all time and I think that's okay. Right. Absolutely. Like you can be. You don't have to be good at everything. You don't have to fit in everywhere. But a lot of leadership literature doesn't like that. Like you should be able to lead everything from NFL team to animal hospital, to peewee soccer. it's just not like that.

Megan Sprinkle:  I, to me, I find that slightly freeing. Like, it's like, you don't have to save the world. Just it's okay. It's not your job. Save a corner of the world. You don't have to be good at everything. 

William Tancredi: Yeah, you just be good at what's in front of you and that's enough. That's more than enough. 

Megan Sprinkle:  That's Fantastic. I think that also speaks to really leveraging your team as well is Maybe that's also an element of where you're hiring Is like what what's the? Thing that could make us all better 

[00:22:00] like what is that piece that it's so it's not necessarily the sameness, right? It's like a puzzle piece. It's the fit meaning. It's that key that makes everything flow better. And Just like a marriage, right? Very rarely. Do you marry someone who's your copy person, right? There's usually some, I would never do that. I would not marry myself. So there's a balance, right? , so I think , that's part of leadership too, is just knowing what everybody's strengths are and making sure that they're working in their strengths. 

William Tancredi: And, you know, I, I really like to be a leader who's main job is chief obstacle remover. I don't like to hire smart people and be like, don't use your brain. Do exactly what I tell you to do. I prefer to point them in a direction and let them find what they do well and continue to do that and encourage that and there's some, you know, cultivating that some 

[00:23:00] redirecting and pruning and stuff that you need to be like, maybe go this way instead of that way. but there's ways to do it that are empowering for the right people it's very fulfilling to do that to see that you've gotten to somebody leadership is about making people better and finding the way to make people better is important, is a really rewarding skill.

William Tancredi: It's like making animals better. And I feel like people treat leadership as like, this is the one medicine that will cure everything. And it's like, no, not really.  

Megan Sprinkle:  it'll change in two years. 

William Tancredi: Exactly. And it's like what's popular and what's thought of and who's got the best marketing team, and that's not really what leadership is. This works better on some people and that works better on others. And some people need to be led in a way that is not a skill I possess. I'm probably not a very good leader to those people, so maybe it's a bad fit here, but somewhere else they might 

[00:24:00] thrive. 

Megan Sprinkle:  you mentioned marketing as well. And so you have brought something up in our pre call that I don't know. I hadn't really stopped to think about what it was. You said you talked about the Vetty award. And so I looked this up. The Vetty award, if someone is like me and you're not quite sure what that is, it's an international award that recognizes excellence in the animal healthcare industry.

Megan Sprinkle:  And it is an award by NAVC or NAVC. And you won last year best in show for nonprofit for Doc's Little Free Library. And as we're talking about leadership and being a solo practitioner in a small town, you win this big award because the best in show that was for profit is like Zoetis. So

William Tancredi: Yeah. Yeah. That's huge. So we had no business. Yeah.  

Megan Sprinkle:  Tell me about that. 'cause I think that's really fascinating. What is the library, how did that work into the hospital, and was like the whole team behind 

[00:25:00] it? 

William Tancredi: I think it was last September or so. I was listening to Brandon Brashear's podcast when he interviewed Seth Godin, and Godin talked about authenticity, and authenticity is a nice idea, but when sometimes your authentic version of yourself gets some hate mail, it's like, yeah, you have to accept that you rubbed people the wrong way.

William Tancredi: but I listened to that podcast. I was like, you know, what can we do, what have we done that really defines it? And on DVM 360, I saw an announcement for the Vetty awards. And I looked at it and I was like, yeah, we built a little free library in front of the hospital.

William Tancredi: One of my life's missions is to give books away. And when I built the hospital, I put bookshelves up and all the books I've read in the last couple of years, I put on the shelves and when a client or somebody, we talk about them, I give it to them. I don't loan it. I give it away. And it's important to 

[00:26:00] me because. I think giving away books makes the world just a little bit better. And I like the idea of a free library. And I love that I can come in like, and every couple of days, like the whole library's changed, like I, all kinds of books I've never seen before. And the Vetty award application gave some structure and shape and language to what we were doing.

William Tancredi: And I used it as a kind of a staff rallying point and was like, let's do this. Let's apply like it's us. we're not going to win. Like we've had no business with it. Like the last thing that one was like a national commercial from Merck. Like, absolutely. We're not even close. Like we are not in this class.

William Tancredi: And one of the guys, Devin, who loves to take pictures, he took some really good photographs. the staff was in the pictures, and it was authentically us. It's not for profit, right? Like it's, we just give them away. We don't sell them.

William Tancredi: It doesn't make us any money. It costs us a lot. I get a scolding from my 

[00:27:00] bookkeeper periodically. But it's who we are. And I was shocked as hell when we got the email that said, congratulations, you've won. And we're sitting between Zoetis and Behringer Ingelheim and their ad agency, like, what agency are you with?

William Tancredi: Like, we are so out of place here. but they were very gracious, and the folks at NAVC were just really lovely and kind. And so that was our Vetty award. And it's just sitting on the shelf out front as our silly little book giveaway that

William Tancredi: is the story of who we are. it's our commitment to learning and connection and authenticity. And the courage to be yourself. I think that's important. I think it takes more guts than we give it credit for. 

Megan Sprinkle:  Yeah. What was their reaction at the clinic when you told 'em that you had won?

William Tancredi: I think they were more surprised than I was. 

[00:28:00] They were, they were excited though. It was, I mean, that was, that was the point of it.  They were excited. It was a reminder that this tiny little 10 person practice at Chad's Ford, Pennsylvania can compete at as high level as there is.

William Tancredi: And I think I let it empower them too, right? Like we do good work here. Surgery research is being done here.  AI research is being done here. We're winning awards. We can win the best veterinary hospital in my hometown, but to win a Vetty award was a big deal.

William Tancredi: It was a way to remind them too, which was nice and to show them that this is who we are and it matters. 

Megan Sprinkle:  Yeah, back to what you said at the very beginning of the attraction to veterinary medicine was, doing something that matters. And I think this was something that you and I talked about that there's a lot of challenges of veterinary medicine, and we'll probably get into that here in a second. But 

[00:29:00] there is something special about what we do and that no matter the challenges, it does seem that it's worth fighting for. And I'm so glad that your hospital, I hope that they see that through, a little bit every day that what they do matters, but it is nice to be recognized on such a large level that I was like, Oh, wow, cool.

William Tancredi: . Yeah. It was exciting. It was, validating to feel that and you use the phrase that you had used in our pre call that I really liked was “it's worth fighting for”, and to do it well, and to speak up, and to be disliked, those are all hard work. They are all require courage, and it's because this is worth fighting for, because this matters. It's worth, standing up and doing something about, even if there's a risk to you. Even if it might upset people, even if they might not like you, even if, you know, things might not go your way 

[00:30:00] William Tancredi: because of it.  Standing up for what you think is right. 

Megan Sprinkle:  absolutely. And going back to AI, you mentioned, your hospital is doing AI research. And the phrase I'm hearing over and over again is this constant seeking for better, better learning. And so my guess is that AI kind of fits in that is that AI can help be more efficient, but in your words, what are the things that kind of inspire you and make you excited when it comes to bringing in more AI tools into veterinary medicine.

William Tancredi: I'm so glad you asked. My friends and family are certainly glad I will talk about it to someone else. I think there are two aspects of it. I think the one really important one is communication.  these large language models, have the capacity to really enhance and facilitate. they can change language. They can change tone. They can overcome education 

[00:31:00] barriers, which I really like.  You can use it to create analogies. You can use it to create other things. And as veterinarians, even when we think we dumb it down, we don't the time.  My wife has a phrase about translating doc into human.

William Tancredi: And I think it does that very well. And I think that allows us to connect and communicate with our clients better. I think it also makes us better doctors because it can improve compliance. And if we can impress upon someone, like I told them, like, yeah, they don't know what that means. we have minutes to talk to people.

William Tancredi: AI can explain this over and over and over again until they can understand it. The other thing that I've really liked about its use in medicine is its use as a, I'll call it a diagnostic aid.  when you're diagnosing something, how often do you or I get past the fourth idea of a diagnosis, not that often, you're usually right in the first couple, right? First couple of guesses, you know how to test for it. You find

[00:32:00] it. AI is really good at that eighth, ninth and 10th idea for that really bizarre case. It doesn't diagnose it, but if you ask it to come up with a differential list, it's actually pretty good at that.

William Tancredi: There was a study in the new England journal of medicine about creating a differential list for bizarre cases that were found in that journal. And it outperformed internists and physicians. And it didn't get the diagnosis, but it included it in a list of 10. And I think that's very powerful if you know how to use it.

William Tancredi: Right. Like if you use your car to get to the airport and then walk to the plane, that's great. If you try to drive your car onto the airplane, that's a problem.  so if you understand how to use it that way, it can really enhance your practice in medicine, and like I said, the communication is just.

William Tancredi: Where it's at. It can lower or at least reduce the emotional burden and bandwidth you need for heavy conversations, whether you're responding to a 

[00:33:00] bad review or responding to a good review or writing an employee review or communicating with someone who you're collecting an invoice and they haven't paid you.

William Tancredi: and freeing up those emotional lifts and that emotional bandwidth gives you more time to do what you want to do and spend it on things that really. Matter even more than vet med, like family and friends and being present and your whole focused self for your loved ones. And I think that's a considerable burden in veterinary medicine and one that we benefit from having lightened a little bit 

Megan Sprinkle:  or a lot of it, you know I think I heard you say on another podcast too That you leverage an AI scribe as well and you commented that it can actually make a nicer worded.

William Tancredi: It's a lot nicer than me. 

[00:34:00] You know, the 10th negative fecal email of the day, like I'm pretty direct. like you're just getting the facts. And if you leverage an AI scribe and it's nicer, it's a little gentler for people and it's a little nicer for people. And it's not that I don't care.

William Tancredi: And it's not that I don't want to be that best version of myself, but, it helps and the communications better and nicer and gentler and reminds us of our own humanity in the process and frees it up to do the things that need more of you.

Megan Sprinkle:  And I happen to know you are expecting a little boy here in March. So has that further helped you think about leveraging different tools. ‘Cause again, you are a solo doctor practice. you don't not have another doctor to take over, and I loved , your thoughts of the whole family comes in and hangs out in the office 

[00:35:00] and it's a family affair. what are your thoughts about that? And, and being able to incorporate things that. As passionate as you are about veterinary medicine, there are other things that bring us joy as well. So yeah. How, how can we do that better? 

William Tancredi: I'm a step parent, but expecting this marches, Will is my first. And I would be completely outrageous and churlish to give parenting advice, but I hope that this technology allows me to give more to him, my other two kids and my wife, so that I can be the best version of myself for them. This hospital and my work as a veterinarian is probably going to be the first line of my obituary. This is my life's work, but that is the most important thing that I'll ever do is them. 

[00:36:00] And. To do this well is important and it matters, but it doesn't hold a candle to my obligation and my devotion to my family.

Megan Sprinkle:  That is powerful. A lot of what we do is our work and that probably will be our first line, but again, when I ask, spoiler alert, I'm about to ask you what you're grateful for. When I ask, everybody that your family is the first thing that comes to their mind and even though we're also very grateful for a lot of things in our profession, I think how I like to say it, thanks to a wonderful therapist who put it in these terms is, is we only have.

an emotional bundle of points, right. At the beginning of the day and wasting handful of points on writing fecal report, you know, it's probably not the best use of our points, so if we can leverage tools to do something like that, which works so well, it's 

[00:37:00] amazing. 

William Tancredi: Yeah. We've got to learn to use it. Yeah. Go tinker, like go play with it. Go do fun stuff, go do silly stuff, go ask it questions. It's imperfect, but if you spend an hour with it and you, I know everybody spent at least an hour on their phone today, like if you spent an hour with it and you found no use for it.

William Tancredi: Bless. But I bet most people will. 

Megan Sprinkle:  Yes. All right. As we're running out of time, what is a piece of advice or wisdom that you would like to share with the veterinary profession? Just like the first thing that comes to your mind?

William Tancredi: I won't say be yourself. I'll say be your best self. Be the person you want to be when they talk about you and they remember you. Be the best person you know how to be. You know, if there's a gap between who you are and who you want to be, close it. And that doesn't mean being inauthentic, that just 

[00:38:00] means doing the work you need to do to be the best version of yourself, because I think this profession is full of these incredible, brilliant, powerful, passionate people. And it's a fight to see when you see people doing what they do well and enjoying it and doing good in the world. We were just at VMX and I've never felt the profession feel that optimistic and that positive and that hopeful for the future. And I'm really excited for it.

Megan Sprinkle:  I agree. I think I felt that too. I think I even felt it before VMX. And I don't know if it's like me willing it into believing, but then you do. You get there and people are really excited. You can see it in their eyes and the way they're talking. So , I completely agree that we are in store for some really exciting things. And I think it's good to, to stay informed of them because sometimes that's what you need 

[00:39:00] that day where you read an article about somebody getting excited about something, that can be enough to lift you up and give you a couple extra points. So yeah, I love that. So thank you for. For all that you do. I know writing is, it is rewarding for you, but you don't have to do it. and there's a lot of benefit in keeping people in the know and open to different perspectives. So thank you so much for that. 

William Tancredi: and it's an honor to do a podcast with you because I know, , podcasting is for you, what writing is for me and you are fast becoming the Terry Gross of veterinary medicine and interviewing people and your curiosity and enthusiasm is making the profession better. Every single one of these you do. So it's an honor to be a part of it. 

Megan Sprinkle:  Well, thank you again. I still think you give me far too much credit. Terry's going to hunt me down and be like, but Thank you very much.

Now we've talked a lot about different things you enjoy doing, but is there like a, an interest or a 

[00:40:00] skill that maybe not a lot of people know about? 

William Tancredi: no, I'm not that interesting. I love to read. I love to write. I really love building Legos. I'm not that I'm not that an exciting guy. I pretty simple interests.

Megan Sprinkle:  Okay, well, then we'll have to talk later about Legos. I did sneak a new thing in my background, which 

William Tancredi: I like the postcards. 

Megan Sprinkle:  My favorite. So yes, I could talk about that for a little while, but I won't. Oh, speaking of someone who is constantly looking to learn, is there something on your bucket list that comes to mind?

William Tancredi: Oh, there's a to-read list that'll take me the better part of my remainder of years. You know, I don't have grand aspirations beyond trying to do well in the day and enjoy it and you aspire to great things and aspire to do a good job. But to do that, you gotta be present. You gotta be conscious of where you are and who you are and what you're doing and take

[00:41:00] joy and fulfillment and satisfaction from what is not just what could be. 

Megan Sprinkle:  Yeah. That's very well said as well. And I hinted at this question. I always like to end on what is something you are most grateful for.

William Tancredi: The opportunity to meet this little boy in a month.

Megan Sprinkle:  I'm very excited for you.

Megan Sprinkle: Thank you for joining us on Vet Life Reimagined. I want to thank our sponsors through our hosting platform, Buzzsprout, FYR Consulting and Will Hughes. We are looking for more opportunities to collaborate, to continue to grow and sustain the podcast on audio and YouTube, so please check our website, VetLifeReimagined.com to learn more. Until next week.