Good Neighbor Podcast: Virginia Beach
Good Neighbor Podcast: Virginia Beach
Good Neighbor Podcast: Virginia Beach
Ep. 4 Innovative Healthcare Solutions with Club MD Now's Julie Rekant
What if you could access medical care as easily as ordering a pizza? On this episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast, I chat with Julie Rekant, co-founder of Club MD Now, a pioneering healthcare service designed to fix the frustrating delays in traditional medical systems. Julie, alongside her husband and business expert Amy Przymuzala, is changing the game by providing quick and efficient care for minor ailments. Tune in to hear the inspiring origin story of Club MD Now and how this innovative service is making a difference in the Virginia Beach community. With a dedicated team of emergency medicine-trained physicians and a seasoned women's healthcare nurse practitioner, they're ready to provide personalized care from sinus infections to weight loss counseling.
Julie walks us through the seamless experience awaiting patients who connect with Club MD Now, all through their user-friendly website. She explains the importance of their responsive, on-demand service available daily from 8 am to 10 pm. You'll learn about their flexible options, whether you need a one-time visit or comprehensive support. Plus, Julie shares insights on how they ensure patient safety by carefully evaluating each case and directing patients to appropriate emergency care if needed. With a unique approach and commitment to compassionate care, Club MD Now is truly revolutionizing healthcare accessibility in the region.
Club MD Now
Julie Rekant
Virginia Beach, VA 23451
info@clubmdnow.com
www.clubmdNOW.com
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Denise Taylor.
Speaker 2:Welcome to episode number four of the Good Neighbor Podcast, Virginia Beach. Today we have our neighbor, Julie Rekant and with the business Club MD. Now Welcome, Julie, Thank you. Thank you for having me Tell me about this new business.
Speaker 3:So Club MD Now formed approximately 10 months ago in our soft launch but has been being brainstormed for several, several years. So my husband and I are in partnership with Amy Przymuzala, who had always had an interest in medicine but is a business guru. So she had approached us and said it would be so fun to be in business together. We're the medicine minds of it and she's the business mind of it. So after a lot of discussion and throwing out different ideas over really a few years, we came up with the idea of Club MD Now and the development process took about a year. So we did our soft launch last January and then our launch into the community in May and our goal was to really bridge a gap of a very frustrating breakdown in the medical system where patients can't get quick care or their care takes too long. So we're here to sort of fill in that gap and give people immediate medical care for minor ailments.
Speaker 2:So tell us how that works in terms of getting in touch with you guys and what are typical ailments that you guys, you know, work through.
Speaker 3:Sure. So the way you reach us is through our website. So you go to clubmdnowcom and follow all the instructions there. Dot com and follow all the instructions there. Initially, you complete a form that will take you out to a medical intake. We really need some details about your medical history so we can safely and appropriately treat one, including things like chronic medical problems or what medications patients may be on. From there, you sign a consent form and then you're immediately connected to us, and once you're connected with the doctor, you have the option of texting with us, doing a video call or even a phone call.
Speaker 3:And Club MD Now is staffed by emergency medicine, trained physicians and also myself, and I'm a women's health care nurse practitioner. All of the clinicians have over 20 years of medical experience and I personally address any women's health care needs and I also take care of the weight loss part of our business. So you're going to get one of us, yes, and then, based on your complaint, you may say, for example, I'm interested in weight loss options. Then that would be triaged to me and I would take care of you. Or you may say, hey, I've got this terrible nasal drainage, I've got pressure in the front of my head I feel really icky and that would go to one of the ER doctors on staff that day. And we're available to take care of you on demand 8 am to 10 pm and, aside from examples like weight loss and sinus infections, we take care of really almost anything.
Speaker 3:And if we feel like we can't, we're going to tell you exactly what to do in that moment. So, for example, if a patient reached out to us and said hey, I'm 45 years old, I'm a little bit sedentary, I'm a smoker and I've got this chest pain, I've got this heaviness in my left arm, we're going to send you for immediate emergency evaluation. So even if we can't fix you, we're going to tell you exactly what to do. But you know, things that we can fix are nausea, vomiting, now. Again, if you have prolonged abdominal pain and we follow up with you and the medicines we gave you just aren't helping, again we may send you out to a local ER. But anything we can do in the moment we're going to do Urinary tract infections. If somebody needs treated for a headache and they have known migraines and just have a lapse in their prescription, we're going to help you with that prescription gap. So things that you might get an urgent care, for we try to take care of in that moment.
Speaker 2:Is there a membership component? So?
Speaker 3:there are two options to get care from us. If you are somebody who says, hey, I'm a really healthy 30-year-old but I've just got this cough I can't shake, you might be appropriate for a one-time fee, which is $79. And for those folks who are interested in the weight loss counseling, that is a one-time fee as well. But if you say, hey, I'm somebody who's kind of constantly running in and out of urgent care and I hate sitting there. I'm getting coughed on while I'm sitting there. I'm waiting over 30 minutes, then you may be the person who wants a membership. And for a single individual to have access to us 365 days out of the year, 8a to 10P, that is $1,000 for unlimited visits with us per year. And if you want us to take care of your entire family, that's $2,000 for the entire year. And, again, there's no limits to those visits. You can access us every single day if you need us. That's awesome. So those are the three price tiers either a single-use visit I'm sorry, go ahead.
Speaker 2:No, go ahead. Tell me about the three price tiers.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so it's either a single-use visit and one individual has a cap of two single-use visits, and then we recommend a membership. So there's the single-use visits and then we recommend a membership. So there's the single-use visits and again $79 with a cap of two, and then the membership tiers are individual or family, and they're either $1,000 or $2,000, and that's per year.
Speaker 2:Okay, you've already talked about this a little bit, but in terms of your patient, who would be your perfect avatar, who are you?
Speaker 3:guys trying to reach. So yeah, very good question. We are happy to take care of literally anyone in the state of Virginia, out of the state of Virginia, certainly within the continental US, but anybody who feels as if they want the convenience, we're their person. If they feel like our price point's affordable to them, we're their person. We are happy to literally work with anyone. So anyone that feels like we're a good fit for them, we're going to take care of you. And again, we're staffed by emergency medicine trained physicians, so they have training in all fields of medicine.
Speaker 2:I love that. So outside of this business with your. So what do you do? I know you do have a lot of fun in the community, but tell me a little bit about what you do for fun in Virginia Beach and beyond.
Speaker 3:So professionally. I am a nurse practitioner with Complete Women's Care, where I've been for almost 21 years, and I work part time which allows me to be very involved in Club MD now. I absolutely love my job. I'm not going anywhere. This is a passion, club MD Now and I'm so excited that we got it launched and off the ground. But fortunately I have time to maintain my career as well. Our emergency medicine physicians they also maintain their emergency medicine jobs and are staffed, usually on their days off. That just kind of varies For fun.
Speaker 3:I mean, my husband and I love Virginia Beach. We have two children and have used every aspect that this city has to offer and really all of Hampton Roads. We like to go out. We definitely love to wine and dine. We love the beach, we like to boat around the waterways. So we feel really, really lucky to be in Virginia Beach and use all that it has to offer. We also like to travel, and travel as much as we possibly can. But our son is down at the University of Georgia and that's become our new love to explore the world of Athens, yes, and experience UGA football.
Speaker 2:So tell us a little bit about some life challenges you guys have overcome. That would help either people in their own personal life or in their business life.
Speaker 3:Sure, so we've definitely had life challenges. Evan and I met when we were in our mid-20s and life was pretty carefree. It was where was the next travel destination, where was the next dining destination? And we're both from very loving, amazing families and we merged and got married. We had our son, ethan, in 2005.
Speaker 3:He was then diagnosed with cancer in 2009. 2009. So he was actually just shy of his fourth birthday when he was diagnosed. He had acute leukemia, which is the most common childhood cancer. Our daughter was one at the time of diagnosis. So it was a very busy time in our lives. But again, our amazing families and our huge friend population just rose to the occasion and really took very good care of us, as well as the amazing staff at CHKD. So we were able to sort of ride that first really, really difficult year of his cancer treatment with a ton of support. He was treated for three years, three months and 30 days to be exact, and after the first year life was a little bit better. It was a maintenance regimen, but we had a lot of years of a child with cancer and also a toddler who we really wanted to still give every bit of attention that she absolutely deserved, and I think it was probably hard on her, although she doesn't remember any of it, you know mom and dad were gone a lot. I slept every single solitary night in the hospital with Ethan when he was in the hospital. Fortunately, a lot of his care was outpatient. But that was our first sort of big hiccup in life.
Speaker 3:Fast forward to 2018, I was diagnosed with cancer. I have leukemia as well and still have it. I have chronic leukemia. Interestingly, our cancers are not genetically related at all. We both sort of just got a bad lightning strike, but both of us are doing amazing. So my son has been free of disease really since very shortly after treatment, has had yearly follow-up and is healthy.
Speaker 3:I have a very, very treatable form of cancer that I just take an oral chemotherapy tablet every day and also I'm no evidence of disease and really on a great path to live forever and ever and ever, hopefully.
Speaker 3:My husband's even had melanoma, so we've all kind of been down the road of health challenges and it also opened up our eyes to the medical system as patients. So we've always had the blessing of being medical providers and you can kind of slide in the back door. Sometimes as a medical provider, you can get your lab work done quickly or you can kind of pop in and out of a physician's office because you may know them as your colleague. But we've both been in situations where there's really no back door and we're patients too and unfortunately, with the demand of healthcare right now, patients don't get quick service and they again, if they feel like they have to go to an urgent care, they're sitting in an urgent care getting exposed to other ailments COVID flu, whatever the case may be and we're trying to again bridge that gap. And we know what it's like to be a patient, both my husband and I.
Speaker 2:I love the fact that you guys can really relate to other people. Yes, in this medical whatever people may be going through Maybe it's not cancer, but you do understand the kind of time management you're going to have to take the kind of care you want, the respect from the doctor, the kind of communication you want. And I love that you guys have been on both sides of that being the provider and being the patient yes. And having a child who needs that special care yes. Well, I appreciate you being on the show today.
Speaker 3:Oh, I'm so happy to be here and thank you very much for having me. And thank you for highlighting Club MD. Now. We're super excited about it and really looking to further expand our offerings into the community.
Speaker 2:So give us your website and phone number, just so we have that on the recording website and phone number, just so we have that on the reporting.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, it's clubmdnow. com and we do have a web chat, if you need a quote phone number.
Speaker 2:that's the easiest way to chat with us. Okay, Thank you, Julie. Recant with Club MD Now. We appreciate all you're doing in the community and your story and sharing it with us in Virginia Beach.
Speaker 3:You're absolutely welcome. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to gnpvirginiabeach. com.