Today we’d like to introduce you to Gayan Poovendran.
Hi Gayan, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
When I was growing up, I was always getting hurt playing sports. I spent a decent amount of time at the orthopedic doctor’s office, dealing with knee issues, shoulder issues, and broken bones.
Somewhere in that time, I decided I also wanted to be a physician, particularly in orthopedics and sports medicine. I suffered another injury in college and got frustrated by my lack of options. The two orthopedic surgeons I saw (both close family friends) told me that they would avoid the surgery as much as possible and recommended trying cortisone injections and therapy. They told me the recovery from surgery would be somewhere between 12-24 weeks, and I would need to be in a sling for at least 6. As luck would have it, medical school, exams, internship, and residency got in the way of me being able to have the surgery.
To keep up the activity level of a 21–22-year-old, I relied on regular steroid injections and almost daily prescription anti-inflammatory medications. My pain level and quality of life were still not what I wanted. Knowing the bad effects of cortisone injections, I started researching alternatives to healing and came across PRP injections, which were very new at the time. I was hooked on the idea of healing injuries without surgery, particularly with little to no downtime. I focused on non-surgical orthopedics and joined an orthopedic practice. Performing PRP and other OrthoBiologics injections was much more satisfying to me, as I was able to help heal my patients instead of just managing their pain with things, I knew were doing longer-term damage.
After 7 years in that orthopedic practice, I joined a new practice tasked with focusing on regenerative medicine treatments. About 3 years later, I decided that I wanted to have more freedom to push the boundaries and be innovative. Thus, PRO Institute was born last year to give me that freedom.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
As doctors, we receive poor education on the business side of medicine so I was concerned about how that would get managed properly. However, I have been fortunate enough to have a wife who has a keen business sense so this was a huge help in establishing PRO Institute.
The medicine portion has been the easiest part since I’ve been doing this for over ten years. Having said that, one of our most difficult hurdles is getting patients and doctors to understand what it is that I do, as this is a non-traditional type of medicine.
In addition, having patients understand that not all PRP is created equally is another challenge. Since there isn’t a board certification for PRP yet there isn’t a process or a standard clinics are upheld to. I see more and more clinics popping up offering PRP, but no where near the quality and comprehensive way that it should be approached.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
The practice is called Poovendran Regenerative Orthopedics Institute, or PRO Institute for short. We specialize in regenerative orthopedic sports medicine. We are known for our concierge and comprehensive approach to treating sports and activity-related injuries. We treat each patient like the individual that they are and use our extensive experience to custom-tailor a treatment program for that individual.
Each peptide program, vitamin IV, PRP, and “stem cell” procedure is customized to each patient. Even though we are a young practice, I have been practicing regenerative medicine for over 10 years, and I use that knowledge to help optimize our patients’ health. I think what I am most proud of brand-wise is how our level of service has made our patients become our friends and our family. We have patients from all over the world seeking us out to help get their quality of life back.
We’d be interested to hear your thoughts on luck and what role, if any, you feel it’s played for you.
I believe strongly in the saying that success is when preparation meets opportunity. I think I have been blessed with a lot of good luck and opportunities in my career. My residency program had a sports medicine fellowship that closely aligned with my goals, allowing me to get a jump start on my training. Luck brought me to South Florida as I was getting ready to accept a position in Ohio before interviewing in Fort Lauderdale.
There I had to work to prove that these procedures work and that this style of medicine is best for patients. My last opportunity came at a time when I was looking to make a move, and the timing could not have been better. I’m lucky in met my wife, who instilled in me the confidence to take a leap like this, as well as bringing in business savvy and helping drive home the customer/patient experience from a completely non-medical perspective.
Contact Info:
- Website: pro-institute.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pro_institutemd?igsh=cHl6Mm1jMDRqcG5t&utm_source=qr
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gayanpoovendranmd?mibextid=LQQJ4d
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gayan-poovendran-md-caqsm-5b002365?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=ios_app
- Other: https://www.instagram.com/gayanpoovendranmd?igsh=ZDZtbXVsbzNtdTFt&utm_source=qr
