From what I’ve read previously, Nurse Practitioner practice in Florida has some unique challenges. And apparently this is true for Psychiatric Nurse Practitioners as well. This question comes from an NP in Florida who wishes to open her own psych practice.
I am a Psychiatric/Mental Health Nurse Practitioner and Clinical Nurse Specialist, BC. I’m working in community mental health at this time and know that I want to go into business for myself in the future. I’m finding it difficult to acquire information on what the boundaries are for Psych NPs in the state of Florida. I’ve read through Nurse Practice Act but it doesn’t mention private practice. It also leaves the Clinical Specialist scope of practice very vague. Do you have any resources or people that may know about my area of practice? All the NP’s I know work for other people or facilities so I would appreciate any help you may give me.
If you have information about practice in Florida, particularly psych practice, please feel free to post a comment below, or send me a message and I’ll post it for you. Thanks!
Hello, maybe you can help me. I am an FNP in New York State. I am interesting in opening an urgent care center in NY State. I want to be the owner, but would like to hire an MD or two to be my mentoring physician. I want to know if this is legal to do or does the MD need to be the sole owner of the business? Does anyone know how i go about doing this or where i can find information? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
Mary
One of the other NPs on the site, under the section on billing, suggested a book — which I just now purchased, plus another one on the same topic — they are available at Amazon. One is called Money and Outpatient Psychiatry: Practice Guidelines from Accounting to Ethics
“, by Mikalac, 2005, and the other one is Getting Started in Private Practice: The Complete Guide to Building Your Mental Health Practice
“, by Stout and L. Cope Groud (date I am not certain of…paperback, looks like it’s not an old copyright date). Good luck.
Mary,
You would have to go to your state board of nursing and ask them if it is legal for you to own your own practice. If you are not comfortable with going to the board of nursing, ask other NPs in your state who would know the laws as they pertain to NPs.
I would contact a NP who maybe has been around and knows the laws and what you can and cannot do. They might tell you that you can own a practice and then turn around and tell you that you have to have a MD in the office 50% of the time or something equally ridiculous. Also check on medicare and medicaid rules and regs because if you want to care for the M/M patients in community care, the rules and regs dictate what you must have in order to practice in a NP practice.
Good luck and e-mail me if you need any other info that I might be able to help you with.
Sincerely,
Nina Ravey
I don’t know if this will be helpful but I am a Clinical Nurse Specialist in MA where we can work independently with minimal supervision and many of us own our own practices. I started mine 7 yrs ago by taking my caseload with me out of a group practice. This would be unusual today ( no business would be willing to lose that revenue stream) but at the time there was no one else to pick up the psychopharm piece in the group.
Start up is the challenge now. Either one needs capital to fund months of overhead and turnaround of billing, getting known in the community ,and getting a referral stream giong – getting empanelled with insurers… OR purchase a business that is already established with active caseload of patients and active referral stream. Such a sale could be structured for ease of transfer, assistance with funding’ etc. I am seeking an entrepeneurial psych RNCS or NP interested in a charming seaside community within miles of Boston. Also interested in hearing from others who have sold their NP business.
Hi,
This blog might be a bit old, but for anyone interested. I would recommend doing a search for the name: Carolyn Buppert, NP, JD
http://cme.medscape.com/viewarticle/508395
As I have searched for information r/t NP and Private practice, Carolyn Buppert, NP, JD, is the most prolific source on the topic that I have seen. She has numerous articles that you can “Google” . The last time that I checked she had 2 or 3 very informative books on the subject. She may also still offer consultations.
Generally speaking, if you are interested in starting a private practice, I would certainly read Carolyn Buppert books. In addition, I believe you are right, some people are threatened by others achievements, (the upside to jealous people is that they help eliminate the competition. Bitter people usually just stand on the sideline and snipe, they never get in the game).
I might suggest, searching in your state (or another state with similar NP laws) for other NP who are already in private practice. Unless, you are planning to open up right in the middle of the area that they are practicing in, Im pretty certain you could call somebody out of the blue and explain to them what you are trying to do and I bet you that 9 of 10 (or better) will be happy to offer suggestions when they are not seeing patients. (I’ve done that many times). Generally speaking, people who are actually entrepreneurial minded, enjoy seeing others succeed and don’t mind helping out. They know exactly what your concerns are and might may very well toss in a couple things that you may not have considered.
On the overhand, you could get started without opening your own practice. For the time being, you could offer your services as an NP to a MD in practice. (May have to pitch your idea to a few of them, but you will hone your sells pitch with each one). You would most likely need to develop a business plan that detailed the benefits that you could bring to the MDs practice. Make sure that it answers all the questions that the MD would want to know (how much will you bring in verses how much he will pay you. Will he/she be sued if you screw something up? Prove to him/her in black and white that with phone numbers to call to check it out, that they wont be digging a hole for themselves. Put yourself in the MD shoes and think about what you would want to know before you hired an new NP. Puy an executive summary as the first page with bullet points highlighting the benefits that he/she would receive by hiring you, in the body of the plan make sure the numbers bare out your expectations.
To get started and overcome the fear of failure, just tell yourself that you are going to simply check into it and gather all the info to see if it looks like it could be successful. You don’t have to pursue it. however, you may become a believer as you begin to see the possibilities along the way.
……….