Out of Practice

Why retirement doesn’t always mean you stop seeing patients

Help patients with diabetes get care on your own time

Why get started?

For those planning
to retire or already retired

❝I would encourage you to think about spending a limited amount of time taking care of patients with diabetes in underserved areas via telemedicine — medical practice without the hassles. This website will tell you how rewarding this can be based on my several year experience and how to do it.

You talk to anybody who’s retired, and they’re okay for a couple of years — play golf, play bridge, take trips. They miss interacting with patients. The solution: giving retirees the opportunity to come back and interact with the patients again, in a situation where they’re not really pressed for time and can get to know people.❞

Interview with Dr. Santen explaining the process

Play Video

Dr Santen, Emeritus Professor of Medicine at the University of Virginia, has taken care of patients with diabetes via telemedicine for 6 years and has developed an enjoyable way to do this.

Let's talk to the patient

Interview with patient and nurse educator demonstrating the interactive process

Meet our team

Telemedicine team busy at work in their offices.

Get back into practice – To make a difference

The Challenge:

Lack of access for patients with diabetes mellitus living in rural, financially challenged, underserved communities. Lack of endocrinologists to take care of these patients.

The Solution:

Retired endocrinologists get back into practice using telemedicine and interacting with community health centers to markedly benefit patients.

Rebooting the retired endocrinologists

All clinic personnel are there to help any hassles.

Patients with diabetes mellitus living in rural, financially challenged, underserved areas lack access to endocrinologists to help manage their blood sugar levels. There is a major workforce Gap in the number of endocrinologists available to take care of these patients. A solution is to recruit (‘reboot’) retired endocrinologists back into practice. By using telemedicine and interacting with community health centers, they can markedly benefit patients. The established methods to do this eliminate all of the hassles usually associated with the practice of medicine in a hospital, clinic or private practice.

News Posts / Articles

Back to work. A solution to the shortfall in diabetes care in the USA

In the United States there is a shortage of endocrinologists to treat and advise patients with diabetes mellitus.

Challenges to care of patients with diabetes in rural, underserved areas

Patients with diabetes mellitus in rural communities face major impediments in achieving and maintaining control of glucose levels and preventing complications; patients in these areas endure their healthcare being medically underserved and financially challenging.

Podcasts

Patients Come First

Blogs

Underserved Diabetes

Professor Richard J. Santen, MD from the University of Virginia, explains the need for retired endocrinologists returning to work to manage patients with diabetes in America’s rural underserved areas, including a comment on telemedicine

Road map

Getting Started

Contact Dr Richard Santen at [email protected] to direct you to the navigator to guide you through each step of the process

You need to look up the list of Federally Qualified Community Health Centers and select 1 to 5 that are in your state. To find the state by state list click on:
https://data.hrsa.gov/data/reports/datagrid?gridName=FQHCs

Dr Santen will then contact the CEOs of each and determine if there is a need for Endocrinology consultants. He will also determine the willingness to provide sufficient consultant fees to pay for medical malpractice, renewal of license, dictating software etc. He will also devise a plan, setting up a contract. The consultant ongoing reimbursement is estimated to be about $500 per month and covers all set up costs. Dr Santen’s consultant contract provides a template for this arrangement.

Follow the navigator’s directions for obtaining the necessary insurance and equipment needed including:

Malpractice insurance
Renewal of medical license
Setting up of LLC (Limited Liability Corporation)
High resolution TV camera
Home computer
Scanner
ZOOM software
Encrypted e-mail from FQCHC
Dragon one dictation software
Adequate broadband internet service
Cell phone service for patient calls

Setup an employment contract and you are ready to start