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BLOG: Getting out of a DWI
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A number of years ago I overheard a colleague who works for a large eye care device company tell me she had to speak to a doctor about his “DWI.” “Driving while intoxicated,” I soon found out, is not what she meant. It turns out DWI stood for “doctor with an idea.” Evidently, this frequently used industry term refers to the awkward situation in which a doctor approaches a company representative with an idea for a product or service. Company representatives frequently get requests from doctors to talk about their ideas, and very often those ideas are not particularly well thought-out from a standpoint of patentability, regulatory FDA approvability or actual commercial value. Still, occasionally valuable innovations come about from these discussions, and it’s good customer relations to hear out an idea.
Truly, we doctors who are on the front line of patient care share similar experiences, and each of us brings a different perspective based on our outside interests and exposure. Indeed, most of our great medical advances have come from practicing doctors. But advancing an idea from idea to standard of practice or to standard of care is extraordinarily challenging.
In the cover story of this issue of OSN, we explore paths taken by successful entrepreneurs in ophthalmology, such as Malik Kahook, Emmett Cunningham, Mark Humayun and others. These visionaries not only had good ideas based in clinical practice, they had the perseverance to vet their ideas with critical colleagues, overcome significant patent obstacles, start companies, raise funding, oversee clinical trials, negotiate with the FDA and figure out how to sell their product. There are no shortcuts in any of these steps, and each one brings a thousand tasks. Each inventor faced disappointment and rejection far more often than success, and each one will tell you that persistence paid off far more than a brilliant idea.
Jim Barksdale, the founder of Netscape, famously had three rules for running his company:
“The first rule is if you see a snake, don’t call committees, don’t call your buddies, don’t form a team, don’t get a meeting together, just kill the snake. The second rule is don’t go back and play with dead snakes. Too many people waste too much time on decisions that have already been made. And the third rule of snakes is: all opportunities start out looking like snakes.”
In other words, sometimes the best thing to do with a “great” idea is to kill it before it causes a time-consuming distraction to your everyday life.
Starting my own software company, MDbackline, a solution designed to help doctors communicate with patients undergoing cataract surgery, I’ve experienced great moments when my idea is embraced by others who benefit from it. I’ve also experienced how true all Jim Barksdale’s principles can be. Challenges are more common than successes, and running a startup company tests every skill of the entrepreneur.
So, if you’re a DWI (doctor with an idea), realize the tremendous challenges you’ll face if you want to make your idea become “the next big thing.” Have a glass of wine, don’t drive (so you don’t get a real DWI) and think about the road ahead. Indeed, the idea is the easiest part.
Disclosure: Hovanesian reports he is the founder of MDbackline Inc.