Eyeworld

WINTER 2026 | EYEWORLD | 49 C Nicole Fram, MD Dr. Fram has found that the most important lesson for practice building is communication with outside referrals. "The first question I ask a patient when I walk in the room is, 'Who referred you to this practice?'" It could be a friend, someone in the build- ing, or an optometrist. Real-time communica- tion is something that's missing from our lives, Dr. Fram said. "We have a system in our office where if someone is referred by a friend, we immediately trigger our admin team to send a thank you note." If a patient is referred by an outside doctor, her office will also reach out with a thank you. Dr. Fram said this is the way she's wanted to build her practice ever since she joined Samuel Masket, MD, in practice. While everyone knew Dr. Masket by reputation, Dr. Fram said she was motivated to learn everything she could and make sure every referral source knew her name and that she was going to bring a high level of care to patients. "Whenever we've had new doctors join our practice, the ones who are successful are the ones who understand that simple rule of Dr. Thompson said that mutual respect and making sure all practice partners are happy has been key. "This idea of equality or egalitarian- ism is important, whether it's your partners or your staff," he said. "It really resonates with people because I think it's the best way to treat people." For young ophthalmologists approaching referrals and reputation, Dr. Thompson said these are absolutely critical. "It's about relation- ships, and people, including referring doctors, want to get to know you," he said. While many doctors will go around and meet the doctors in the community once, Dr. Thompson said a lot of them won't keep going back or won't work on other outreach. "We aren't just looking to have a referral relationship. A lot of our referring doctors have turned out to be good friends." Dr. Thompson said the biggest impact on his success has been "love." "What I want to do is start my journey with people whose hearts are open to loving their fellow person, and that has been the main key to my success," he said. When considering if there was anything he would have done differently in his first 5 years of practice, Dr. Thompson said he wishes he had understood how you can work on building a team culture by reading books and using other resources. Putting the patient first is incredibly important, but he said it's equally important to value and prioritize your whole practice team because that makes the best practice atmosphere. "One of the keys to our success has been relying on each other as partners and teammates to go out and win this together. It has really resonated with my fellow partners as far as this 'team first' mentality. If I was start- ing over today, I would have done that at the beginning of my journey because no one had ever taught me anything like that, which again relates to the business and working with people part of medicine." He added that another key to the success and growth he's enjoyed with the people he works with is a willingness to lead, when asked to lead, and a willingness to follow, when that makes the most sense. continued on page 50 "Working with great business people not only extended me but made me better," said Dr. Thompson, here in discussion with one of the practice's business leaders. Source: Vance Thompson, MD

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