Three of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money, Business/Entrepreneurship and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). The healthcare industry will always be around as people will always need care of some sort. A lucrative business may therefore be supplying products for use in the field. The following contributed post is therefore entitled, Professionally Providing Products to the Medical Field.
When we think of setting up a business of our own, the majority of us tend to consider providing general consumer products to the general consumer market. This makes sense. After all, the majority of us are consumers ourselves, so we are better able to identify gaps in the market. If there’s something that we want and can’t access, we may start up a business that creates these products and make them accessible for others. It is also generally easier to set up a company that provides products to a majority – the more people your product appeals to, the more people who are likely to make purchases and generate profit for you. However, the market is becoming increasingly saturated, due to the simplicity of setting up an Ecommerce store online and certain products are now offered by so many suppliers that profit margins are minimal, as companies have to undercut each other constantly for profit. Instead, why not consider a completely different field of commerce and cater to a more specialist market? There’s a whole lot of money to be made in the medical field!
Do Your Research
Before you get started, make sure to do your research. Know the field that you are dealing with and understanding their standards. Know what the equipment needs to be able to do and figure out a way to offer it at a lower price point than current providers are selling it for. Alternatively, alter the equipment in order to improve it or make it more functional somehow.
Specialise in One Product
When offering a product to the medical field, it is generally best to specialise on one specific product. You don’t have to worry about medics buying your product once and then having to reach out to a new market – medical equipment gets worn out, so customers are likely to return to you time and time again. Medical equipment also tends to be very specific, so it’s best to make sure you are providing one perfect product than offering various moderate products – medical institutions will only purchase the best.
Outsource Your Manufacturing
As we have now established, your products need to be perfect. So, generally speaking, it is best to outsource your manufacturing to companies with price equipment like cutting services and laser cleaning services. You can then create a test batch to try selling. If things take off, you could then invest in the necessary machinery and equipment in order to be able to manufacture in-house yourself.
Be Ready to Pitch
You’re going to have to really sell your product here. The type of sales you’re going to make aren’t really going to be one-off impulse buys. Institutions are going to make bulk purchases. So, make sure that you can pitch your products. This could make our break a huge deal and determine whether you succeed or not!
Sure, specialising in producing medical equipment is relatively complex and isn’t the easiest path to take. But if you get things right, you could make a fortune by selling just one line of products!
“You all keep saying that you want to go to medical school, but you don’t have the slightest idea as to what it takes to get into medical school, or what’s going to happen once you get there!”
I originally published this piece on the Examiner back in January of 2013. It discussed some simple, but valuable career advice a professor from my undergraduate institution gave me and my classmates. If followed, this advice would likely save the student, their family and their schools money, time, and heartache.
It isn’t just the close relationships with the faculty that are advantageous, but also the “tell it like is” mentality with which they taught us. The instructors felt as though they had to be hard on us students in order to make us competitive, to help us reach our potential, and ultimately, to achieve our dreams. Some students rejected this approach, while others embraced the guidance and the coaching.
Many students who major in the biological sciences do so with hopes of going to medical school and becoming a physician. Not only is being a medical doctor a well-respected profession, but it is also believed to lead to a life of wealth and prosperity; something many doctors and the author of The Millionaire Next Door, Dr. Thomas Stanley, would debate.
During my first year at JCSU, a very simple but important piece of advice was passed along to the students in our Concepts of Modern Biology class. That advice was simply that we students should take some time to research our careers of interest. Again it was simple but very powerful advice.
“You all keep saying that you want to go to medical school, but you don’t have the slightest idea as to what it takes to get into medical school, or what’s going to happen once you get there,” our professor, a Ph.D. of Cell Biology, passionately said to us. She was small in stature but was a very tough-minded professor.
“What you all need to do is to go to the library, pull out a book on the healthcare professions and read up on what it will take to become a medical doctor,” she further advised us. She’d often say, “the slots are limited,” meaning that it was very competitive to get into medical school and they would only take the best of the best. A couple of driven, motivated and talented students from JCSU in that era did in fact go on to medical school to pursue their dreams.
It was debated quite a bit at the time whether or not students from a small HBCU like JCSU could get into medical school. The students who made it in proved that it could be done, but again they were some of the best and brightest that our Natural Sciences Department had to offer.
* * *
I took my professor’s advice and investigated the path towards becoming a medical doctor. In between semesters, I visited Buffalo’s downtown public library and pulled out a book on the healthcare professions. Some of what I discovered in my research, I’d heard before; applicants needing a competitive score on the Medical College Admissions Test (MCAT), a competitive grade point average (GPA) particularly in the sciences, letters of recommendation, and scientific research or volunteer experience in a clinic or hospital.
What I read next though were the real eye openers. Financially, many medical students offset their tuition with loans and graduated with hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt. Medical school graduates are required to complete something called a “Residency” which usually involved them getting little sleep over long periods of time, depending on their specialization. They further had to be willing to move to often remote and undesirable locations in some instances initially. Finally, most don’t start making significant money until long after they’ve graduated or completed their training.
After doing the research, I decided that I didn’t want to go to medical school to be a physician. I stayed in science but decided to go into research which itself had its own notable challenges and struggles, though ultimately quite a few rewards. See my post on that.
The point of this story is not to discourage anyone from going to medical school, especially if treating and caring for patients is a student’s underlying motivation, dream and passion. A career is a personal choice and must be decided by the individual. That being said, it’s important to do the research, study the process and figure out all that will be involved when pursuing a particular career path.
At one point, being a medical doctor may have been a very lucrative profession to pursue, but as with most areas of life, things seldom stay the same. Significant factors that medical doctors have to contend with today that they didn’t worry about as much in years past, is the impact of Health Maintenance Organizations (HMOs) on the degree of care patients can receive, and the threat of malpractice lawsuits.
“You want to do something that you’re going to enjoy doing every day. If you’re doing something just for the money, it’s not a good thing,” a mentor advised me. In general, careers should be pursued not simply for the money, but based upon what a student is passionate about and has a natural talent for.
Furthermore, the cost of seeking a professional education such as attending medical, dental or law school, for example, should be strongly considered before pursuing a given career. Specifically, the amount of debt that will have to be repaid should be one of the major considerations as it will impact an individual’s lifestyle for a potentially significant amount of time.
Thank you for taking the time to read this blog post. If you enjoyed this post, you may also enjoy:
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A key focus of my blog is Health/Wellness. Unfortunately there are instances where medical procedures and treatments don’t go as planned and the patient becomes injured or even dies from the administered care. In these cases, it’s very important for the patient and their family to know what to do. The following contributed post is thus entitled, What To Do When Medical Treatment Goes Wrong.
You’ve just undergone medical treatment, but it hasn’t been successful. Perhaps you’ve had a reaction to a drug or there were some complications during surgery that have led to other injuries. Perhaps you were promised that a certain pain would go away and it hasn’t. Whatever the case, it’s important that you don’t ignore the warning signs. Here are just a few steps to take if you suspect there’s been a medical fault.
Talk to the doctor that gave you the treatment
Your first step should be to get in contact with the medical professional that gave you the treatment. You may have been warned about certain side effects beforehand or told after treatment about complications, in which they will likely have given you instructions to get in contact again if things got worse. In most cases, your doctor will be willing to take a look at the problem and decide what further action to take.
Get a second opinion
You may wish to get a second opinion if you feel you can’t trust the doctor that gave you the treatment. When it comes to symptoms that aren’t visually clear such as unusual pains, nausea or dulling of certain senses, this second opinion could be useful in helping you to get a clear diagnosis.
Take things higher
In the case of a serious medical error, you may want to file a complaint to the head of the clinic. Medical clinics often have staff that deal solely with complaints – in the case of large hospitals, there may be lots of complaints to process, so don’t worry if you don’t get an immediate response. You could also consider taking things higher and complaining to the governing body in charge of the clinic – they will be able to launch an enquiry into the incident and may be useful if you feel that the clinic’s staff aren’t taking your side.
Consider a legal claim
When medical treatment goes wrong, it’s often possible to seek legal compensation. There are many lawyers out there that deal with medical malpractice. It could be worth looking for specialist attorneys to help you make the best case – whether you’re looking for a transvaginal mesh lawyer or a brain surgery lawyer, you’re certain to find someone that specialises in this area. Many lawyers won’t charge you unless your claim is successful.
Decide on your future treatment options
Corrective treatment may be needed to recover from the medical error. For example, in the case of a faulty hip replacement, you may need to seek hip revision surgery. A legal claim may be able to cover the costs of this. Whilst you may be apprehensive of trusting doctors again after such an incident, it’s important that you receive the corrective treatment that is recommended otherwise you could create further injuries for yourself.
