One thing that often got Dr. Anastasia Gentles worried at the emergency room was children that were brought to the hospital with fevers and ear infections. When she probed the medical history of these children, she often noticed that they picked these infections after the primary-care doctors employed by the schools they attended were off duty.
With the help of a friend from her local church, Dr. Gentles established NightLight Pediatric, an urgent care center strictly for the treatment of children. Today, the facility has eight pediatric urgent care locations, with 130 staff and an $11 million revenue on their books, as reported by Forbes.
However, this is the flip side of the care center’s humble beginnings in 2007. The passion was to create alternative urgent care with the best pool of health professionals dedicated to taking care of only children.
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Dr. Anastasia nurtured the idea for this business for 10 years when she worked at Texas Children’s Hospital emergency room. When the frustration of cases presented to her swelled up, she spoke with a friend, Zawadi Bryant, to help her start the business. She also had support from another colleague, Connie Cazares, who helped her start the first clinic in Sugarland, Texas, according to fierce healthcare.
Zawadi had no knowledge in the medical field; she came from an industrial and engineering background, and was a supply chain manager at Hewlett-Packard. However, she had immense knowledge of operations management, which informed the subsequent decision to make her Chief Executive Officer after she co-founded NightLight Pediatric Urgent Care with Dr. Anastasia. Connie Cazares, on the other hand, was a senior medical assistant with Texas Children’s Pediatric Associates offices in the Houston area.
Dr. Anastasia started off as a wildlife biologist and switched to studies in zoology. During graduate studies, she felt zoology wasn’t key to her interest, and decided to study for a medical degree, discovering her strong affinity for children in the process.
Like any other business, one of the difficulties Nightlife faced in its early stages was funding. However, Dr. Anastasia was confident that the center was structured to play a significant role in its immediate community and would make a turnover in a short time.
Unlike past times, when the norm at many pediatric clinics was long queues, overburdening bills, and inconvenient appointment times with doctors, the emergence of NightLight Pediatrics has to a large extent revolutionized how pediatric care is discharged in the Houston areas. Patients are made to feel they are of top priority.
NightLight Pediatrics opened its first branch three years after operation, and opened a third branch with the influx of more clients; its growth has been steady since it was first established in the early 2000s. In 2013, the center began recording impressive revenue and clocked $3.48 million, $4 million in 2014, and $5.9 million in 2015. It was later adjudged as one of the 2017 Forbes Small Giants.
Dr. Anastasia credits this triumph to her two colleagues who transitioned from church members to business partners. The journey hadn’t been smooth from the start, however, their faith has sustained the business since its inception, according to Houston Business Journal.
