Welcome to the MedCoShare Podcast, where CEO Ronak Vyas sits down with Dr. Jutta Vogt, a seasoned psychiatrist specializing in hormone optimization and weight management. From her roots in Germany to pioneering integrative approaches in the U.S., Dr. Vogt shares her journey and vision for the future of psychiatric care. Discover her insights on individualized treatments, expansion plans, and the evolving landscape of holistic medicine. Tune in for a fascinating discussion on healthcare entrepreneurship and patient-centric practice models.
Ronak 0:00
Welcome to the MedCoShare Podcast, the podcast where we learn everything about what it's like to be a private practice healthcare practitioner in today's world. We dig deep into the challenges of being a healthcare practitioner, but also the rewarding aspects that the work entails. My name is Ronak Vyas, and I'm the CEO and co founder of MedCoShare. Dr. Jutta Vogt is a board certified child and adult psychiatrist who has been in practice for over 20 years. She graduated medical school from Albert Ludwigs University in Freiburg, Germany, and completed her adult psychiatry residency training and child psychiatry fellowship at Drexel University in 2001. She uses as little medication as necessary and believes in empowering patients to tap into their self help skills to get the best outcomes for themselves. In her spare time, she is an outdoor enthusiast, which she believes brings balance and enhances her work with patients in the mental health field. Dr. Vogt has been expanding into hormone optimization with the launch of her most recent practice of Dr. Hormone MD, as she saw a need for hormonal well being that is currently neglected by traditional psychiatry. Dr. Vogt, Welcome to the med kosher podcast.
Dr. Vogt 1:07
Thanks so much Ronak. I'm very honored to be here today.
Ronak 1:12
Perfect. So tell us a little bit about yourself. And what made you become a physician?
Dr. Vogt 1:16
Yeah, so I grew up in Germany, and also in a religious household, or everybody was religious those times in Germany, you know, everybody went to church and everything. And so I was very interested in is there any life after death, I was very inquisitive. So I was reading books and libraries. And now this is actually a completely different field in, in medicine, now they have like this near death experience research, you know, but that time, that was very intriguing for me. And so I became more interested in the body and the brain. And then I decided to go to medical school was like, in my late teens that I decided to do that. And people always ask me nowadays, you know, isn't it difficult to go to medical school, but actually, for me, it was really easy. I liked it, I love to learn, I like to do new things, you know, so, and I did then studied medicine in Freiburg, Germany, but because I like to expand and experience different things. I actually then did an internship in South Africa. And what I liked about that is that you could rotate through different disciplines. So I could do a little bit of surgery, Gynecology, pediatrics, internal medicine, but I didn't want them to be there forever. And then I went to England and started psychiatry. It was always for me, like either emergency medicine where all the action is, or psychiatry, because I was really interested in the brain body connection. So I decided to do psychiatry. And while in England, I also did my exams, my medical exams to come to the US. So it was always for me, either the US or Australia, because to be honest, I like the better weather, like the Dressel in England or in Germany, so I took the medical exams. And then I came over here, and I did a residency training at Drexel University for my adult psychiatry. And then I did also child psychiatry. And after that, I've worked in different settings, including an academic setting, like the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, where I was an attending, and I taught medical students, psychiatry fellows, and also saw patients and I ran the consultation liaison team there. And then I went into other fields like community mental health, residential treatment facilities. And then I actually founded my own practice called behavioral health choices, which ran for about 10 years. And it was a lot of fun, and I like to expand and eventually we had about 50 psychiatrists and therapists, but because of COVID, there were some issues with staffing, shortages, admin staff. And then I thought the best way to what to do is to sell the practice because it has expanded too much. At that point.
Ronak 4:17
Yeah no, definitely makes sense. There was a lot of you know, changes and just not only just for businesses, but people's perspective during during the pandemic. So you mentioned a lot of very cool places, South Africa, London, and Philly, of course. So what's your favorite city?
Dr. Vogt 4:33
I have to say, Cape Town. Yeah, the weather is beautiful. You're surrounded by beaches. The people are beautiful. But you know, the economy is not necessarily the best. I think it's still better to live somewhere in the North Country. Right.
Ronak 4:53
Cool. So tell us a little bit more about your experience before joining MedCoShare.
Dr. Vogt 4:58
Yeah, I said I I rent my own practice with 50, psychiatrists and therapists. And so as I wanted to then expand into the hormonal optimization after I sold my practice, I was looking around and I found you online, and then we met, you know, and I think it's really cool that you're offering that membership to medical professionals, because that way, any physician or other medical professional can start out with a practice. And I like the membership that you have, because then clinicians don't have to commit to a five year lease, you know, and deal with all the utilities and everything. So I like your concept.
Ronak 5:44
Oh, thank you so much. So let's talk about your current practice, which is hormonal therapy, as well as weight loss. You mentioned why you got into it. But can you just tell a little bit more about what you're seeing now? And why you think that's important?
Dr. Vogt 6:00
Yeah, I think that hormone optimization has really been neglected in psychiatry, you know, there are lots of patients that are in their 50s 40s 50s 60s, even sometimes in their 30s, you know, they have hormonal imbalances. And so sometimes just maybe correction of those imbalances would actually help or cure their mental health, or in addition to an SSRI or something. So that's why, why I chose to do this. And what I think is unique with the services that we provide is that we can really individualize the hormonal optimizations. So it's not like some of these online companies that I had been seeing, and my patients have brought that up to me. So you subscribe to one of these online companies, and you get your testosterone cream shipped to you, it's like a cookie cutter approach, you know, and there's not much lab monitoring there either. And so what we can do is really individualized because we have injections, we have gels, we also have pellets, which not everybody provides. So pellets are actually like rice, kernel size, hormone. Like pellets, you know, like little devices that you put inside under the skin, and then they release steady hormones for three to four months, you know, so it's very easy. And we individualize that. And I think a lot of companies online, they also don't do any lab testing. We do lab testing initially, and then also follow up. Yeah, because it's very important.
Ronak 7:44
Yeah, I think a lot of these online companies are kind of taking advantage of the trend. You know, just saying people have low testosterone, or, you know, abnormal hormone, hormonal balance. But, you know, like you said, that individualized treatment, as well as looking at it holistically, is really critical, because once they send you something, you know, in the mail, they're not really doing anything else, right after that.
Dr. Vogt 8:12
Exactly. And especially with testosterone, you know, you have to monitor the hematocrit, you know, otherwise, your blood becomes too thick, and you're prone to clots or thrombosis, you know, and also, you know, your estrogen could rise, you know, so you need to monitor that too. And maybe you need an estrogen blocker. So we do everything individualized and make sure that you're healthy.
Ronak 8:35
No, that's very, very good. Some of the challenges you faced starting private practice, can you give some advice to other people who want to start a private practice, but may not know where to get started? Or what to do?
Dr. Vogt 8:51
Yeah, so basically, the only challenges what I'm facing right now is just to get the word out. Because the patients that sign up with us, they're very happy, you know, and they stay with us. But we just need to get out there a little bit more people need to find us a little bit more. So that's the only challenge that I'm experiencing right now. But that is like with every business, if you start something, it takes a little while to catch on or for people to know that you're around. And so anybody wanting to start a private practice in general, right? It's always good to start something small alongside your regular job and then grow bigger. And I think as you said, you provide a great service for those professionals because it can start small and then grow bigger. And if anybody is interested in hormone optimization, I really can recommend, for example, the American Academy of anti aging and functional medicine also called A4M. They have terrific courses on hormone optimization, and you also can become board certified in anti aging medicine, which I'm pursuing And regarding the pallet placement, so hormone pellets, there is a great company called Pella Calm, they actually invented a device, which I'm using, it's so easy to use and then doesn't really leave a scar. I mean, it's it's so nice. And there's no pellet extrusion of very minimal just because of the design of the device. And it was invented by Dr. Chuck Home, who is a board certified gynecologist. So that's what we're using in the practice. And that's what I can recommend people if they want to venture out in their way.
Ronak 10:31
Right. So yeah, I think you hit on something that's really important, which is, you know, it's good to do this as a side gig to kind of test the market and to build your practice, build your name, even when we launch MedCoShare. You know, in my former life, I was commercial real estate broker and investor. And I didn't stop that until maybe a year or 18 months into, you know, into formally launching MedCoShare. And thank God I did because the first year, you know, was the pandemic. So we signed the lease in January 2020. And then everything's shut down. But we still have to pay the rent, you know, pay all the bills. So it was a very, very difficult year. And it was kind of my main job that allowed me and my co founders to ride that to ride that wave and to be able to come out the other side. So going back to your practice, and you know, right now you're in King of Prussia, you're also in our Marlton, New Jersey location. Do you have any plans to expand outside of these regions? Or I know you're also doing telehealth. So can you just let us go over your expansion plans a little bit?
Dr. Vogt 11:35
Yes, absolutely. So right now, I would like to stay in the King of Prussia and New Jersey area. But I would like to also add more other integrative medicine, areas like weight management, healthy living, and also eventually integrate that with psychiatry because as I said, hormone optimization has not really been really recognized as a part of psychiatry, it's kind of almost like psychedelic medicine was shut down for decades. And now they're suddenly you know, discovering it. So it's the same with hormones that have been around for decades, for centuries, millions of years. Right. But they haven't integrated that in psychiatry yet. So I would like to do that eventually going forward.
Ronak 12:19
Sure. No, that's great. Dr. Vogt where can patients find you.
Dr. Vogt 12:24
Yes, they can go to my website. It's www.drhormonemd.com
Ronak 12:34
Wonderful. Thank you so much.
Dr. Vogt 12:36
Thank you.
Anthony 12:37
MedCoShare provides turnkey medical office space for health and wellness providers. Our memberships are month to month and providers can rent one or multiple rooms based on their needs. To learn more, please check out medcoshare.com Or stop by one of our locations and get started today.
Ronak 12:55
If you want to hear more of these conversations as we dig deeper into the lives of our members, please follow us on Spotify, Apple Music or wherever you get your podcast. Follow us on social media to hear more from our doctors and nurses, as well as to keep updated on all things MedCoShare. We hope you'll join us on the next one. And until then don't forget to practice your way
