Most people think that business owners have some special education in business, marketing, or even an MBA. The truth is that the best business owners leverage their passions and skills to design businesses that meet specific needs.
Nurse practitioners have a wealth of knowledge and are often passionate patient advocates who have ideas beyond simply working in a hospital, nursing home, or other care facilities for the rest of their lives. Their entrepreneurial spirit makes them the perfect small business owners.
When partnered with the right idea, the right team, and the right education, there are plenty of business opportunities available to nurses.
Start Your Own Private Practice
The great thing about becoming a nurse practitioner is that in most states, you are now qualified to function independently as a medical professional. This means that nurse practitioners can diagnose and treat their patients without an overseeing doctor.
Owning a private practice is a great business opportunity for the entrepreneurial nurse. With additional training, like ENP certification, these nurses can do far more than send a patient home with an antibiotic and a script for rest and fluids.
Launch a Nursing School
Teaching what you know to the next generation of nurses is critical. The expertise and experience of the average nurse practitioner are invaluable. There are plenty of things that nurses can teach that go above and beyond what is taught in textbooks. Sharing personal experiences helps to make education come alive in practical ways.
New nurses may not understand the value of some of the things they are taught. But a nurse practitioner-led nursing school ensures they get more than they bargained for in their nursing classes. Starting a school to offer CEUs and, if your state allows, more in-depth training, are both excellent ways to use your nursing education outside of a clinical environment.
Open a Birthing Center
Healthy women can birth in settings outside of a hospital. These are often far more comfortable and have better outcomes than using a traditional birthing model.
Certified nurse-midwives and nurse practitioners can easily start a business with their own birthing center. Not only can it be a safe and comfortable place for moms to give birth, but it can also provide classes and other resources to the community at large around birth and parenthood. A birthing center is an excellent business idea for a nurse practitioner.
Create Useful Medical Devices and Apps
There is nothing that says a nurse can’t create an app or design medical devices. Their experience using devices and apps gives them a unique perspective on apps that would help medical professionals and those that would help patients.
Why not design an app that helps patients remember to take their medications and how to take them? Or perhaps something that could change health behavior would be more appropriate. What about developing more precise listening devices beyond the traditional stethoscope?
There are plenty of opportunities for nurses to put their experience to good use when it comes to designing and developing an app or product.
Become a Medical Writer
Nurses know a lot about medicine. Nurse practitioners have gone through extensive training to receive their certifications. They are master’s level trained, often with additional degrees and qualifications. All of this training makes them great candidates for starting a business doing medical writing.
Why not write about the things you know for medical publications, blogs, and even internal documents for healthcare facilities? Nurses who love to share their knowledge would be great at this type of small business.
Design a Health Coaching Product
Many people don’t need a doctor to tell them that they are unhealthy. They need someone to walk with them through the steps needed to restore their health. Nurse practitioners are often excellent communicators who know how to explain things so that the average person can understand. They are more likely to walk their patients through diagnoses and treatment options.
Beyond that, those skills lend themselves well to health coaching. Some people need natural ways to treat ailments caused by lifestyle choices in the first place. Nurses who can think through the process of health and healing and condense it into a product can sell and resell the same product over and over to multiple patients. They can also offer 1:1 coaching and so much more.