Business Spotlight: Smooth Sailing

There is a need for dermatological care in southwest Missouri, much more so than the greater Phoenix area. But that wasn’t what led Amy Hunt to return to the Midwest and open Spring Derm LLC.

“I had been to Table Rock on vacation and loved the area, with the hills and trees,” Hunt says. “(My husband) Ben is from Southern California, and I told him, ‘You’ve got to see this place. This is God’s country.’ He drove down here with me and just fell in love with it.”

And that’s just part of how the Nebraska native got to the Ozarks via Arizona. Hunt started her career in computers, using her business degree from University of Nebraska-Kearney and master’s in organizational leadership from Bellevue University outside Omaha, Neb. Her employer, Contract Staffing Specialists, helped businesses become Y2K compliant.

“I had a really great job, a great company, and just really felt like I still wanted work with patients,” she says. “I was really missing the human part of it. I’d already had a lot of science classes and decided to go back while I could.”

From there, it was on to the Grand Canyon State and Midwestern University in Glendale, Ariz., where she earned her physician assistant master’s and began working in dermatology.

“I’m one of the few PAs who have a specialty where I have time, training and practice,” Hunt says. “I was hired right out of school with a skin cancer surgeon. That gives me an edge.”

Hunt spent two years working in the Phoenix area before relocating to the Ozarks in 2007 and realizing the demand for dermatological services. She worked part time in the field for three years before going to work full time in 2010 with Dr. Thomas Lynch. She opened Spring Derm, aka Springfield Dermatology Clinic, in September at 5544 N. Farmer Branch Road in Ozark.

“She’s a go-getter,” says Ben Hunt, Amy’s husband and front-office manager. “She’s a strong, independent woman. She decided she’s going to make this business work.”

With two local practices shuttering in the summer, as providers Drs. Eugene Morrow and Daphne Anderson retired, Amy Hunt’s clinic has stepped in to fill the void, along with at least one other – Rajeunir Medical Spa, which opened Jan. 1 in south Springfield. The Kansas City-based Rajeunir chain is owned and operated by Missouri State University graduates Nathan and Laura Irvin.

“Places were already at a three- to six-week wait last year,” Amy Hunt says. “We’re usually able to get people in within about two weeks. If it’s a skin cancer or something new, we work them in within two days. We get them in pretty fast.”

Spring Derm client Anita Zimmerman says not all dermatologists are alike.

“I’ve had instances before where people might be good, but their bedside manner is lacking,” says Zimmerman, a Wilhoit Properties sales and leasing agent, who has had moles removed by Hunt and has brought her children in for skin care consultations. “Amy is the total package. … You can tell she’s genuinely concerned about her patients and their well-being.”

Hunt says her time in school taught her to use patience in treating clients.

“Part of our culture at Spring Derm is to see the patient, see the family, spend time with them and not hurry through,” she says. “We’re pretty close. I hug most of my patients.”

Spring Derm offers general dermatology, with a focus on skin cancer and cosmetics. Working with Dr. Mark Woods of Ozark Family Clinic, Hunt estimates 85 percent of business comes from general dermatology, though she says cosmetics seems to be growing every day.

“Anything skin is under one roof,” Hunt says. “I want to see them for their concerns, their rashes, their acne. If they want to do something a little extra, I want to be there to do that, too. That’s kind of the fun side of the medicine.”

Dermatology is not going to be immune to the changes in health insurance as the Affordable Care Act moves toward full implementation, and Hunt says that will be the biggest challenge her fledgling business faces in 2014.

“It’s a lot to take in, but we’re ready to do it. We’re ready to see the masses of patients if that’s what happens,” says Hunt, who adds it won’t change the culture of Spring Derm. “I purposefully try to take enough time to not just walk in and give what we call a doorway diagnosis. I sit down, I talk with them, ask about their family and work, then I ask about their skin. I want to maintain the time that I give. If I have to extend the hours or days, or add more staff, I will do that. But I hope to just keep growing.”