YFP 327: Pharmacy Innovators with Dr. Natalie Park (Pharmesol)

On this segment of the Pharmacy Innovators, sponsored by Pyrls, Pharmesol co-founder & CEO Dr. Natalie Park joins host Dr. Corrie Sanders.

Episode Summary

With the rise of AI and the increasing use of technology in our daily lives, there is an opportunity to improve the pharmacy world and patient care. On this segment of the Pharmacy Innovators sponsored by Pyrls, Dr. Natalie Park, Co-founder and CEO of Pharmesol, joins host Dr. Corrie Sanders, to discuss how Pharmesol leverages technology and AI to optimize patient communication and follow-up care. Natalie shares her unconventional career path, what Pharmesol is, what inspired her and her co-founders to start it, and how it is improving patient care. She also discuss the highs and lows of starting a business before delving into the importance of value-based care, what pharmacy will look like in the future, and how we can embrace the inevitable technological changes.

About Today’s Guest

Dr. Natalie Park is a pharmacist with a background in conducting health economics and outcomes research in the pharmaceutical industry. Natalie is co-founder and CEO of Pharmesol, an automated and proactive medication assistant tool that leverages pharmacist expertise and artificial intelligence to enhance patient experience after direct interaction with the healthcare team.

Key Points From the Episode

• Introducing Natalie Park, co-founder and CEO of Pharmesol. 
• Natalie tells us about her studies and unconventional career path in pharmacy. 
• The inspiration behind the creation of Pharmesol, what it is, and how it can be used in clinical practice. 
• How Pharmesol leverages AI. 
• The accelerator program Natalie and her co-founders did to start the business. 
• Where she met her co-founders and how their skills differ from Natalie’s. 
• Where Natalie was in her personal and professional life while developing Pharmesol. 
• What she thinks pharmacy will look like in the future and how we can adjust to the technology. 
• Natalie shares the most memorable events of her pharmaceutical career. 
• Her favorite parts of being an entrepreneur and why she enjoys being in charge of her career.
• Natalie shares advice for anyone contemplating a non-traditional career path.

Episode Highlights

“I’m a pharmacist, but that doesn’t mean I know every single thing about every single drug.” — Dr. Natalie Park [0:06:52]

“Starting a company is really difficult. It has been very difficult. Not to say [you should] not pursue it. I do think it is a decision that takes a lot of consideration.” — Dr. Natalie Park [0:25:33]

“I’m bullish on healthcare moving towards value-based care.” — Dr. Natalie Park [0:31:11]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

• Dr. Natalie Park on LinkedIn
• Dr. Natalie Park Email Address
• Pharmesol
• Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator Demo Day
• Pyrls
• Dr. Corrie Sanders on LinkedIn
• YFP Disclaimer

Episode Transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

[00:00:00] CR: Hi, YFP community. Corrie Sanders here, host of the Pharmacy Innovator segment of the YFP podcast. Pharmacy Innovators is designed for pharmacist navigating the entrepreneurial journey. In this series, we feature founders’ stories and strategies that help guide current and aspiring pharmacy entrepreneurs.

Today, I talk to Dr. Natalie Park, a pharmacist with a background in conducting health economics and outcomes research in the pharmaceutical industry. Natalie is co-founder and CEO of Pharmesol, an automated and proactive medication assistant tool that leverages pharmacist’s expertise and artificial intelligence to enhance patient experience after direct interaction with the healthcare team. We will discuss having honest conversations with yourself and others surrounding risk tolerance and career change. And dive into Natalie’s bullish stance on value-based care and the untapped potential within the pharmacy profession to impact health outcomes alongside technology. I know you all will be nothing short of inspired by Dr. Natalie Park.

[SPONSOR MESSAGE]

[0:01:02] JW: This is Justin Woods from the YFP team with a quick message before today’s show. If you’re tired of relying on shared passwords, or spending hundreds of dollars for drug information, we’ve got great news for you. Today’s podcast sponsor, Pyrls is changing the game for pharmacy professionals. Pyrls offers top drug summaries, clinical teaching points, a drug interaction checker, calculators, and guideline reviews all-in-one, user-friendly resource. They also recently added a free weekly quizzes to test your pharmacotherapy knowledge. Whether you’re on your web browser or accessing the mobile app, Pyrls has got you covered. Visit pyrls.com. That’s P-Y-R-L-S .com to get access to more than 25 free pharmacotherapy charts to get you started. Upgrade your drug information resources today with Pyrls. Don’t miss out on this game changing resource.

[INTERVIEW]

[0:01:56] CS: So Natalie, we are so excited to have you on the YFP podcast this morning. We will start with a really easy question of how you got into pharmacy and where you went to pharmacy school. So just tell us a little bit about your pharmacy background.

[0:02:10] NP: Yes, sure. I went to Ohio State for pharmacy school. So I actually came to the states when I was 15. I didn’t speak much English at the time, and I’m not even sure if I had insurance, to be honest, because I was an international student. So I was young, so I don’t think I knew kind of much what was going on with insurance and medical side of things. One day, I remember getting this allergic rash, which I’ve never experienced before in my life. Then I kind of freaked out, and then I went to the pharmacy. Then I showed the pharmacist kind of my rash, and then I remember asking like, “Oh, what am I supposed to do?” And then they helped me out. So that was kind of one of the reasons that inspired me to go to pharmacy school, and I went to Ohio State for both my bachelor’s and pharmacy school.

[0:03:05] CS: Love it. So firsthand experience threw you into the profession. Tell us about a little bit of your training after graduation. So you’ve kind of been on a non-traditional career path, it seems. Since graduation, you’ve done a lot in industry, so tell the listeners a little bit about that path and some of the jobs that you had, or residency training, or postgraduate training after graduation.

[0:03:27] NP: After pharmacy school, I did an industry fellowship in health economics and outcomes research. I had already taken some statistics, and epidemiology classes while I was in pharmacy school, and had some internship experience. Then my post-doc fellowship was at University of Maryland, as well as Novartis. So I did develop budget impact model, cost effectiveness models, when there is a new drug launch to take to payers, as well as using EHR and claims data to do comparative effectiveness research. Then, I went to a health system called Geisinger. First, I worked in their innovation department doing vendor assessment of digital health companies, developing internal business cases, as well as implementing subpopulation health solutions. Then I had an opportunity to move to their pharmacy department where I worked with different service lines, urology, dermatology, primary care, these different departments on the topic of medication management and optimization.

[0:04:38] CS: Wow, that is amazing. So quite a different career paths than I think the average pharmacist would probably think of when they think of one of the options within the profession. So it’s amazing, I mean, you’re working with big organizations just right out of the bat with really high-level thinking with outcomes and clinical decision support tool research, it seems. So kind of a broad-based business knowledge, just based on your years of experience in these innovation departments and working really from just a high-level perspective point of view. I’m sure you took a lot of things away from your previous job experience when you shifted into Pharmesol.

Tell us about the development of Pharmesol. Was there a certain situation where something happened and this business model came to light? Where did the inspiration from the business come from?

[0:05:30] NP: Yeah, I think if I think back, it was few different experiences coming together. Because I was working with the pharmacy team and different clinicians at a health system about the topic of medication management. I just naturally were thinking a lot about medication management, and how can we really improve the status quo, like that was my job. One of the things that I found challenging was that my colleagues, even though they were really motivated to help their patients, because they knew how much help their patients needed, but they didn’t have a lot of time. So that sort of became a challenge over and over again, in different implementation processes.

So I just had this realization and thought in mind that like, wow, the clinical capacity, lack of clinical capacity is such a problem. This may not sound that insightful, but I think it’s really different if you experienced this yourself, like every day, and this is kind of what I’m fighting against every day. So I had that thought on one hand, and then I actually had a poor experience as a patient myself. I always tell people, I’m a pharmacist, but that doesn’t mean I know every single thing about every single drug. I went to a doctor and then got some medication and I didn’t get any instruction about how to use it from the doctor or the pharmacists where I picked up the medication. And then, I came home, and I was like, “Wait, actually, I have a question.” Then I was like, “Wow, this like really sucks.”

Then the third experience is, like kind of during this time, I was – I’ve actually been working on masters for computer science. So as part of this, I built a recommender system. This is kind of the engine that drives kind of personalized recommendation that you experience in Amazon or Netflix. That kind of really made me think about my experience as a consumer, outside of healthcare is actually pretty good. I feel like these systems know me, knows what to recommend for me. I mean, apart from recommendations, just my experience as a consumer. So why can’t we do that in healthcare, is another thought that kind of – that I was having, and a combination of these different thoughts was a big motivator and I think kind of origin story for Pharmesol.

[0:08:20] CS: That’s wonderful, kind of not a three-pronged approach, but certainly three different tiers to the approach and the development of the company. Tell us, and know that you’re talking to an audience of pharmacists that intimately understands the pain points of the profession. What is Pharmesol, and how can it be used in clinical practice? Kind of break that down for us.

[0:08:43] NP: Yes, Pharmesol is a conversational AI. It’s an automated and proactive medication assistant, that enables healthcare organizations to provide high-quality, personalized support for patients through SMS text messages. So the experience for the patient is a little bit like maybe talking to a pharmacist to some degree about like calming counseling points, right? Like, “Hey, I missed a dose. What do I do?” or “I don’t know how to use this injection.” We’ve been working with a primary care clinic, where we white-label this solution. So patients when they get up, medication prescribed at the clinic. After they leave, we send a text message to say, “Hey, have you been able to pick up this medication?” Then, patients either say yes or no, and a lot of patients say no for a variety of reasons. 

Then, we help them troubleshoot. “Okay, tell me more what is the issue.” Some patients are like, “I’m just waiting for delivery” or we have some patients say, “Wait. What? I didn’t even realize I was supposed to be taking this medication.” So that’s kind of an opportunity for med rec, or another patient who said, like, “Oh, actually, I lost a third bottle of my pills, so I haven’t been taking it.” Except, that patient didn’t reach out to the clinic, or the doctor, and they – but they weren’t taking it, and they only told us because we proactively asked this question. So we help them troubleshoot, and then give them education, and then patients also have a line of communication where they can ask questions.

[0:10:24] CS: So kind of really expanding upon the preferred mechanism of communication for a lot of patients, which is text messages. But instead of just saying, “Hey, your prescription is ready.” It’s really taking it to the next level of different counseling points, and making sure it’s a comprehensive follow-up process, and putting this all in the palm of the patient through a text message. So what’s happening on the end of Pharmesol, just so that people can get a complete picture from the consumer standpoint? And then what’s happening behind the scenes? Is this a live-generated chat? Are we using an integration of AI and different mechanisms of literature analysis? What’s really going into the output that the patient ultimately receives?

[0:11:11] NP: Yeah, we’re leveraging AI, and also, we’re training this to say, “Okay, this is the accurate information about this medication, and this is not.” Essentially, don’t lie, don’t make things up.” So how we do that is we hire currently practicing clinical pharmacists to develop our content and what it can say. That is why, of course, it cannot, of course, replace humans, as mentioned, like it can answer, “This is the storage instruction” or “This is how you can use the information” or ask follow-up questions of, “Okay. What is kind of challenging for you?”

Then we also ask questions like, “Have you missed any doses?” What is kind of the reason you missed these doses?” These are the information that pharmacists are looking for to be able to make medical decision making. Okay, maybe this dosage form is right for them or not, or they’re struggling with this. So this is kind of further education, “I want to give” or “I want to have further conversation.” 

But instead of them kind of taking the time to ask these questions, we have the conversation with patients. And then we bring those actionable insights to pharmacists, so then they can really do the high-cognitive task, and make this medical decision making, and then make any adjustments to the treatment, if necessary.

[0:12:46] CS: So really streamlining to use a clinical skill set and a clinical knowledge base, and then leaving the lower-level questions, so to speak to the AI tool. Am I understanding that correctly?

[0:12:59] NP: Yeah, yeah. I think another advantage is, unfortunately, there’s just limited clinical capacity. What I see today happening is, some patients get a lot of support that they need, some patients get no support. I guess, sort of – as relatively healthy, young kind of person as me, pharma health system or the clinic, like the pharmacists are not likely going to reach out to me and ask, “Hey, Natalie. How are you doing? Are you nauseous? Are you feeling dizzy?” I’m not going to kind of be the type to get these questions. 

What our solution enables healthcare organizations to do is actually provide this high-quality care to every single one of their patients, and do the follow-up. We can tell the pharmacist, hey, this patient is doing just fine. So you actually don’t need to reach out to them, but this other person has an issue that requires your attention. So this is how we can increase the quality of care for really every patient, at the same time increasing the efficiency for pharmacists.

[0:14:18] CS: Sure, meeting the patient where they’re at, and then directing the support where it’s needed the most. When did you have this idea, and when did you transition full-time into working with Pharmesol? What did the development look like of the company for you?

[0:14:33] NP: I don’t know. I think I had a lot of different thoughts. I don’t really think there was like one point I was like, “Oh, this is the idea.” Even as I said, I just had different thoughts in the back of my mind. Kind of, “Oh, yes. I think this could be better. Why is it like this? Is this all we can do?” But that doesn’t mean I really thought like, “Oh, I should start up company.” It was like a really – it’s a pretty common moment for a lot of people where you feel like, “Oh, this really sucks.” 

Then, I think it kind of accumulates, compounds, and actually, even what I thought might be kind of a viable business idea in the beginning was not exactly what we’re doing today. But I think what really helped solidify what we’re currently working on was really the feedback of other people, like other pharmacists, other doctors, other nurses, administration, the administrators at health plans, health systems, pharmacy benefit managers, pharmacies. Our team reached out to these folks and ask them, “Hey, what do you think is kind of like an opportunity area? What are problematic and challenging for you guys?” Because I understand – I don’t know, I guess, like, I’m just one person, like one health system just because I think this is a problem, and this is a good idea. That doesn’t necessarily mean other people see the value. So I think it was just through organic interactions. Some organic, some were actually – we reached out to them to learn these insights. I think through that is how we got to where we are today.

[0:16:36] CS: Sounds like a good organic amount of some kind of market analysis and trying to figure out a product market fit for where this kind of technology can really provide the most value. Did you go through some kind of accelerator program or a business development program? Or how did you really hone in on trying to figure out where you are today, and ultimately, what is this end product going to look like? What kind of steps did you take to get to this point?

[0:17:07] NP: Yes. We actually pretty recently completed an accelerator program, a startup accelerator program. It’s called Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator NYC, ERA NYC. My team, I have two co-founders. We’re first-time founders. Starting a company, founding a company, isn’t something we’re used to. There’s a lot of questions, and problems that you’re faced with that you never really had to think about in a corporate setting. I think going through this accelerator program was really helpful from that perspective because there are a lot of mentors, who are previous startup founders, current startup founders, or operators who’ve sort of like really thought about innovation, and developing a new product bringing into market. We definitely learned a lot from being part of this accelerator program.

[0:18:13] CS: Certainly, the aspect of you don’t know what you don’t know, and we’re trained with such a small clinical skill set, especially when you decide to pursue a specialty. I mean, there’s so many aspects of business, and I feel like that’s where a lot of YFP listeners want to start something new or have a new idea. It’s not the pharmacy component that’s the most intimidating. It’s the finances, and the business acumen, and getting funding, or getting your foot in the door with the market. That becomes so overwhelming, much faster than the pharmacy component does in most cases. I can see how an accelerator program is absolutely a great way to make you a well-rounded competitor in a space where you just don’t know what you don’t know, for the most part. So Natalie, you mentioned you have two co-founders. How did you meet these people? Where did you cross paths? Then, what skills do they bring to the company that are different than your own?

[0:19:11] NP: Yes. I’m really lucky to have two software engineers as my co-founders. Saumya is one of my co-founders, software engineer by training. She studied computer science at MIT for her bachelors and she was doing Master of Engineering when I met her. She has a lot of experience applying AI in healthcare in particular. She’s always had a lot of interest in healthcare, so that’s really helpful. Batman is our CTO, also software engineer by training. He had worked at multiple startups, building from scratch. Then he also recently graduated from MIT from Masters of Systems Design and management program. 

I didn’t even necessarily work in a – not even necessary. My work experiences in pharma and health system, I think are really crucial to what we’re doing at Pharmesol. I actually don’t think I could have started Pharmesol if I didn’t work at those healthcare companies, and learned what does the dynamics look like, what do each healthcare stakeholder kind of looked for? But again, the different – in some sense, actually, developing a product I don’t think is that different. I actually think every person in any role is probably developing some kind of product and like looking for a product market fit. But not – I wasn’t in kind of a traditional tech environment. I actually wasn’t even familiar with concepts of like Sprint, how do we use a Jira to do like task of tracking project management.

They definitely bring a lot of expertise from technical and product development perspective. I actually think our team is definitely –one of the strengths of our team, kind of our unique is composition of skill sets and backgrounds, I think is one of the strengths for Pharmesol.

[0:21:43] CS: Definitely. I mean, it sounds like you have an all-star lineup of people that specialize in areas that you don’t. So you become a well-rounded team pretty quickly, which is really important to success in the long run, I think. That’s really so great. I want to highlight something that you said, Natalie, which I think is really important, and maybe will resonate with a lot of listeners. Is that, everyone is problem solving in their job in some way, shape, or form. Whether you realize it or not, you’re probably doing something where you realize that this doesn’t work, or this isn’t ideal, and you’ve either created a shortcut yourself, or maybe you don’t even realize it, but everyone is problem solving on the job. It’s just a matter of maybe being in tune to that, and starting to expand your thinking with, how can I find a solution that works for a larger amount of people, or that can be applied on a larger scale. I thought that was just really beautiful to tap into.

Something else that I would love to ask you is, what stage of your life were you in when you were developing this company? So something that we hear about a lot is that I have this great idea, but I have student loans, or I can’t leave my job, I have X, Y, and Z that are going to be prioritized before I prioritize my own career. Where were you in your personal and professional life when you were developing Pharmesol? If you just don’t mind sharing a little bit of that, I think that’ll be inspirational to the listeners too.

[0:23:09] NP: I was never earning all that much. Let’s just start there. I didn’t have much to lose if that makes sense. From kind of typical, like financial perspective, right? It’s because I was – I would say, I was still fairly early in my career. It’s not like I had developed 20 years of my career, and I’m already in some advanced leadership role at an organization with great comp package, with stock options that just aren’t worth so much. It’s hard for me to walk away from that. That’s not where I was at in my career. I do think, honestly, that helped me in kind of taking a leap of faith. Another thing is, I guess, because that’s where I was at my career, I think my lifestyle was in a certain way, it was very modest again. So I didn’t have to make a lot of lifestyle adjustments if I were to be in a state where I really needed to preserve my runway to be able to focus on kind of this venture.

So you can think of that as a negative thing. But then, it I guess kind of worked out for me. I also say that because I have seen a lot of people around me who are kind of like golden caught essentially. They have really well-paying, high-paying jobs, and that makes them hard to leave. I don’t really think it’s a bad thing to pursue financial security, I think it’s a great thing. So it’s probably – I guess, if you have a question about, it doesn’t make sense for me to leave this financial security to pursue this venture. That might be a sign that maybe it’s not worth it. The fact that you’re kind of wondering about that.

I guess one thing I do want to mention is, starting a company is really difficult. It has been very difficult. Not to say not pursue it. I do think it is a decision that takes a lot of consideration, and ask yourself honestly like, “Why do I want to do this? Is this worth it?” I think there are a lot of low-risk ways to try to validate the problem, idea, the product, and then de-risk it for yourself, and then jump into it. So then you’re more comfortable, and you’re really able to focus on it, rather than worrying about financial security.

[0:26:17] CS: I think that was really well put. So there’s certainly an element of sinking or swimming in starting a new business venture and going full in to see if it works. But unfortunately, that’s not conducive to necessarily financial security or stability. That’s something that we really want to highlight on this podcast too, is that it’s amazing to step into these nontraditional roles, and there’s so much opportunity, but there’s so much variability in how that can be done. A lot of it also comes down to the risk tolerance of the person who’s going to end up making that jump. Where does your risk tolerance lie? Are you really risk averse? Are you going to need to try a bunch of things while you’re still in your financially secure position? Or are you going to be better off taking a huge leap of faith and you’ve got a high-risk tolerance, and you can figure these things out as you’re kind of flailing along?

Everyone is really different, and I think that was really beautifully put about. There’s ways that you can make this a lower-risk jump, while still staying in your current position. Because starting a new company is extremely difficult, like we talked about – there’s so many things you don’t know that you don’t even know until you’re forced to face them with aspects of the business and finances. I just think that was really well said, and thank you for that insight.

[0:27:39] NP: Yes, of course. Just one thing I want to add is, I think one thing I realized over, and over, and over again is, nobody has the answer for you. Literally, nobody knows. I think one of the things, particularly as a first-time founder, I seek out a lot of advice, and there are so many conflicting advice, yet everything is valid. I say that to say, I think some people will probably in this topic in particular like, “Oh, you should take the risk when you’re younger because like it makes sense. You just have less obligations.” Others might say, “Oh, it’s better till you have financial security. You have some kind of leeway to make investments, and then still – if it doesn’t work out, you still have kind of a lot of savings that you can leverage.

But I mean, none of these are really like answers. It’s like, I think only you can figure out what is right for you. So I think just having a lot of honest conversations with yourself is probably the only thing.

[0:28:55] CS: Well, hey, you know what, that answer is very valid, along with the million other answers that you can get from a bunch of different people. I kind of want to shift this conversation a little bit into the evolution of the profession alongside technology. I feel like you’re in a great position to maybe speak to what you think pharmacy will look like in the coming decades. So, I have – it’s a totally loaded question, and there is no right or wrong answer. I can see your face on the screen right now.

But I have a lot of very progressive thinkers and pharmacy entrepreneurs in my orbit, and that’s just a constant conversation piece. What is pharmacy going to look like when a lot of traditional dispensing roles can be outplaced and outpaced with technology? So you’re in a position where you worked a lot with computer information and artificial intelligence and you’ve got a company that’s really relying on those things. What do you think pharmacy is going to look like in the next couple of years, and just any advice for pharmacists that are maybe a little hesitant to address the technology evolution that’s upon us?

[0:30:12] NP: I personally think pharmacy is a huge opportunity area, or just healthcare industry overall. That’s because I think it’s a lever that hasn’t been pulled as much, leveraged as much. Because when I share what I’m doing with Pharmesol, a lot of people actually – their reaction is, “Wait, that like makes so much sense. Why is this not happening today? How come nobody’s asking me if I’m doing okay or how I’m doing?” It’s so obvious when you paint a picture of how it could be, but that’s not the case for a lot of people. That’s why I say, I think there is so much untapped potential and opportunity here for our society, but also for healthcare organizations. That’s partly because I’m bullish on healthcare moving towards value-based care.

I mean, you see these value-based care organizations that are being very profitable because they’re taking on the risk, but they’re also realizing those rewards, which is why I think we will just progressively increasingly move towards value-based care, and what levers do we have to really improve health outcomes. 

I mean, there could be multiple, but I think pharmacy is an obvious one, and leveraging more pharmacists to provide this care. This is also a framework for our success as well because, as mentioned, we are able to really supercharge the clinical team, to be able to more efficiently, and effectively improve patient experience, and then patient outcomes. That’s what I think about the future of pharmacy.

[0:32:21] CS: I love that. I love supercharging the clinical team. I don’t think I’ve heard that phrase before. But I love the evolution of really moving towards value-based care. I completely agree with you. I think that that just has to be the direction that we need to move in order to provide outcomes that can be financially sustainable, but also just supercharging the clinical team with using a pharmacist. It’s so hard on a national level to even measure this because every state uses pharmacists so differently, which is certainly a barrier. But really loving the idea of the profession is underutilized overall. And being able to finally leverage us to practice towards the top of our license in positions like this, and in roles like this, I think will just be a complete game changer for the profession. I love your mindset and I love that you’re bullish on the value-based care model.

Natalie, I’ll kind of wrap things up. I’ve got three questions just to kind of roll off the tongue and provide a little bit of a well-rounded oversight with you being an entrepreneur in a non-traditional pharmacy space. But what is the most memorable thing or event that has happened to you since being a pharmacy entrepreneur?

[0:33:38] NP: Wait, this question is actually really hard. Let me –

[0:33:43] CS: Yes, take your time. It’s all good.

[0:33:43] NP: Most memorable? Okay, I think a couple of things come to mind. I think the first one is when we first put up our product. So we use text messages, and then when I got the first text message from our system, that was pretty exciting. The other thing was, once we started working with patients, patients sent us this response with thank you with the heart emoji. For some reason, I didn’t expect patients to be using emojis. We work with a primary care clinic and it’s a lot of like elderly patients, right? I mean, they text us, but for some reason, I didn’t expect them to send us an emoji. So like, I remember seeing that and just being really happy about that.

[0:34:39] CS: Something so simple and so common, just seeing it put it all together.

[0:34:45] NP: It was very inspiring. I was like, “It was all worth it.”

[0:34:49] CS: No, that’s very cute. That’s so meaningful too, especially coming from the patients. That’s when you know it’s reached your end user, it’s finally making a difference, certainly emotional. What is your favorite part in general about being an entrepreneur and taking ownership of your career path?

[0:35:06] NP: I think this also is in two parts. One is that, I love learning. I think that sort of has been like the North Star in my career, in every role I had. That’s like what I wanted to do, just understand more, learn more. I think entrepreneurship is a great place to do that because so many things I don’t know.

[0:35:30] CS: Endless.

[0:35:31] NP: And so many problems to solve. I think the other is the autonomy. Like, “Okay, here’s this problem, and I’m going to solve this problem today” or “I’m going to do something about it.” That feels really, really empowering.

[0:35:50] CS: I love both of those. You’re right, being your own boss, it’s great to have the autonomy to do what you want. But there are always problems to solve, and you will always be learning. A great combination of two things for you to be successful as an entrepreneur. Last question I have for you is, one piece of advice for anyone that’s contemplating a non-traditional career path.

[0:36:14] NP: One advice. I would say, I would tell them to do something about it. I think that’s maybe one thing that I might be better at than sort of like average people, like execution. It’s not that I’m like doing something well, but I’m doing something. I think that has sort of eventually kind of led me to this path. This can include things like reaching out to people that you want to connect with, and learn, and hear about their story. Or listening to this podcast, I think would be a great example of doing something about it. But I think those are the actions you take, I think eventually become your experiences, and then insights to making decisions in the end. 

[0:37:08] CS: That’s great, great response. Natalie, if the viewers want to reach you and want to take some more action, where is the best place that they can learn more about Pharmesol or connect with you?

[0:37:21] NP: Yes, so I’m pretty active on LinkedIn, so they can find me on LinkedIn. Or my email is [email protected], so they can reach me through my email as well.

[0:37:35] CS: Perfect. We’ll link both of those things in the show notes. We’ll also link the direct website to Natalie’s company, Pharmesol if you want to really see what the product looks like, and learn more about the company. But Natalie, thank you for being here today. We love having pharmacists that are really pushing the profession forward. I think that’s exactly what you’re doing, and it’s beautiful to see, really the pharmacy profession evolve in a meaningful way alongside technology. It was so insightful to hear your responses, and your viewpoint, being a working, living example of someone who’s going to be really successful in that space. Thanks for being here today.

[0:38:16] NP: Thank you so much. I’m super excited to be working with pharmacists, and empower them, and inspired by them as well. Thank you so much for having me. 

[0:38:27] CS: Perfect, thanks.

[END OF INTERVIEW]

[SPONSOR MESSAGE]

[0:38:30] JW: Hey, this is Justin again from the YFP team. Thanks for tuning in to today’s podcast. If you’re a pharmacy professional, you know how crucial it is to have access to reliable drug information. That’s why we’re excited to tell you about Pyrls, today’s podcast sponsor. Gone are the days spending hundreds of dollars for access to drug information. Pyrls offers top drug summaries, clinical teaching points, a drug interaction checker, calculators, and guideline reviews all in a user-friendly resource. Whether you prefer accessing information to your web browser, a Chrome extension, or mobile app, Pyrls has got you covered. Plus, for a limited time, you can visit pyrls.com to get access to more than 25 free pharmacotherapy charts to get you started. Upgrade your drug information resource today with Pyrls. Visit pyrls.com. That’s P-Y-R-L-S .com to learn more. Thanks again for listening.

[OUTRO]

[0:39:23] TU: As we conclude this week’s podcast, an important reminder that the content on this show is provided to you for informational purposes only and is not intended to provide, and should not be relied on for investment or any other advice. Information in the podcast and corresponding materials should not be construed as a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any investment or related financial products. We urge listeners to consult with a financial advisor with respect to any investment. 

Furthermore, the information contained in our archive, newsletters, blog post, and podcast is not updated and may not be accurate at the time you listen to it on the podcast. Opinions and analyses expressed herein are solely those of your financial pharmacist unless otherwise noted, and constitute judgments as of the dates publish. Such information may contain forward-looking statements, which are not intended to be guarantees of future events. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements.

For more information, please visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/disclaimer. Thank you again for your support of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast. Have a great rest of your week.

[END]

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