Business Innovators Radio - Interview with Alfonzo Alexander – Medical Education Specialist

Episode Date: September 7, 2024

Alfonzo Alexander aka Fonz is a best-selling author, speaker and serial entrepreneur who has been in business for over 30 years. He founded a successful building service company and was top in sales for 3 years in a row. Alfonzo is passionate about living a healthy, fit and prosperous life so he can bless his family and leave a legacy. For the last 15 years he has been in the medical industry supporting Doctor’s in providing the highest quality products and services to their patients. Alfonzo is an avid traveler who loves to visit exotic destinations, scuba dive, kite board, play golf, and drive fast cars.Learn More: https://alfonzo360.com/alfonzo-alexanderInfluential Entrepreneurs with Mike Saundershttps://businessinnovatorsradio.com/influential-entrepreneurs-with-mike-saunders/Source: https://businessinnovatorsradio.com/interview-with-alfonzo-alexander-medical-education-specialist

Welcome to influential entrepreneurs, bringing you interviews with elite business leaders and experts, sharing tips and strategies for elevating your business to the next level. Here's your host, Mike Saunders. Hello and welcome to this episode of influential entrepreneurs. This is Mike Saunders, the authority positioning coach. Today we have with us Alfonso Alexander, who's a medical educational specialist. Alfonso, welcome to the program. Thank you, Mike. I'm happy to be here, and I'm looking forward to speaking with you about what I do and also hearing what you do too. Yeah, you know, I love how you are a specialist in education because I feel like too many times people in any profession, but especially your world that you're in the medical industry, people end up being told things that they don't fully understand.

but when you are specializing and educating people, that kind of gives me the connotation that you're becoming their advocate, their source for information so that they're making wise decisions. So I want to dive all into what you do and how you do it and why you do it. Get us started with kind of your story and background. What is your entrepreneurial journey been like to this point in your career? Well, I've been an entrepreneur for a while now, probably about 30 years. I owned, of course I've worked for other companies and things like that. And in doing that, I decided that wasn't really what I wanted to do.

The pinnacle that was when I worked for a telemarketing company in Omaha, Nebraska. And I was training people how to sell, how to talk on the phones and all that. And that's quite a skill. And once you establish that and you train people, to be successful in doing that. I thought, you know what, if I can do this and I'm making about as much money as I can at this point, I'm not going to make any more than what I'm making, I can probably run my own business.

And so by reaching out to other folks in the area, I decided to get into the cleaning business, building service company, and I started a very, very successful business and ran that for about 15 years. And eventually after that, what happened was I lost my aunt to cancer. And during that whole episode, this is the woman that really took care of her body and things of that nature.

And I just wondered, what the heck is going on with health? I mean, you think you got it all, and then of a sudden it's taken away from you. and I kind of wanted to turn my attention toward health and wellness. So I became a personal trainer. You know, I got involved. And then that led to getting involved with stem cell therapy.

And then I became a director of a clinic here in Merritt Island and ran that for a while. It became very successful. And then what happened was the, the federal government shut down all funding for us in this country. I mean, just like overnight. Just shut it down. So now all patients, if they wanted to get stem cell therapy, they had to go out of the country. So I didn't want to move out of the country.

So I was out of that business and I had to recreate myself. And that's why I got involved with some very good. like Ray Perez and things like that that would help me to become a successful business that I am today. I'm involved with wound care. I work with diabetic patients, burn patients, things like that. And I know that's something that's a big problem in this country. It's like the number three, I think number three disease in this country. and there's a lot of people that are affected by it.

I mean, you probably know people that have diabetes. I have a daughter with type one, yes. Yes, see, there you go. And it's a problem. And so I wanted to combat that head on by helping patients to not only change their diet or whatever they need to to become better, and that they do get sick to prevent amputations of their limbs

to help doctors to be able to heal their bodies faster and better. And so that's the journey I'm on right now. And so what I do is I educate people. I go to centers, you know, retirement centers and talk to you have speeches about what we do and how we help patients. And I kind of guide them towards certain doctors that are catered to help them. because a lot of patients, they have the wrong insurance and they don't know what to do. I mean, they listen to commercials on TV.

Well, if you have a problem with your diabetes ulcer, that insurance is not going to pay for any treatment for it. You know, so what good is that insurance doing for you? Nothing. You know, so I try to guide people to make better decisions on how to get the best insurance. I mean, it's up to them, but I just want to give them the information. In other words, educate them on what's available to them, where to go, so they can make up their own mind or what they need to do. You know, a couple of things you mentioned there I find is interesting, which is when they get to the point that they really, really need this thing, this, you know, like treatment or solution, you're guiding them and give them great information. But then you said something else about educating them on making some of those lifestyle choices.

It made me think of something. I think that a lot of people just are wired to logically know, yeah, yeah, should be doing this to prevent that or to have a better lifestyle so that this doesn't happen. And you mentioned diabetes, you know, type one, you know, it's all genetic and it's like a switch that flip. But type two, you can control. My question is this. How do you educate, but at the same time motivate your clients so that they take ownership and make those changes and it sticks? because I feel like too many times people go, yeah, I should be doing this, but I'm just not going to. And then that's when they get to the point of having sores or, you know, diabetic, you know, eye

issues. So what do you do to help them really have that stick so that they're making the decision based on their own motivations? Well, what we do too is, and that's a good question, is we try to have events where they can become an active participant. like we'll have a golf tournament. And I'm trying to expand that more. But you have to be healthy to be able to do some of the things that I encourage them to do. And so if you want to do those things, well, you need to take care of your body so you can participate in those things without pain. You know, so that's, and that doesn't have work with everybody.

But again, like I mentioned before, I was a, I still am actually a personal trainer. And so I'm able to talk to people about extending their life and their quality of life. Okay. Because a lot of these folks, they're over 50 years of age and they want to hold their grandchildren and play with their grandchildren without any problems. And if you have a large wound on your body or your legs or whatever, you're not feeling good, you can't really do that as much as you'd like to. You don't feel like you're a part of the scenario in taking care of your grandkids or participating in activities with them. And worse than that, you may feel like you are a drain on your family because of the situation that you're in. And some of those things can be prevented.

But what I do is I try to tell them up front, here's you need to do to start down the path of recovery. and so if you're doing the best you can in your mind, it makes you feel a lot better and a lot more discipline. You feel stronger and you don't feel like you're being a detriment to the family situation. But just to get the- It almost become self-motivating at that point, doesn't it? Exactly, you know. I mean, I say golfing.

I mean, that's a great achievement. But sometimes just walking on the beach is an achievement. to some of my patients walking without pain, just holding the hand of your loved one, your wife, and just walking through the water without pain, you know. It's incredible what we take for granted sometimes. And so I, and every patient's different. You know, you got to talk to them on their level,

and you got to, you got to sense the pain they're going through and the disheartment that they have, and you've got to give them encouragement. And by giving them that encouragement, they will make changes if it's strong enough. I've got to have people cry right in front of me when we're speaking because they know that, you know, things can be better. And if they have the opportunity to make it better, I remind them that that is accessible to them because they're driving their own car.

They're the driver of their own vehicle at this point. So what would you say is the main problem that you're solving for your client? The main problem, the biggest problem I have with my clients is, I would say, the wrong coverage. I mean, before they become, I mean, when they become my client, they already have a problem. Okay. So when you said that, I mean, it was something like before they become my client, before they have these problems, then it would be educating them on the downfall of diabetes and how to take care of it and how to prevent this, prevent that. You know, but once they become my client, most of it is just making them. Then it gets to connect in them with the right professionals and resources.

Right, exactly. The right resources. and then making sure they do what the doctor tells them to do. I've had, well, I've had one patient, but I've heard other doctors that have patients that won't listen to what they tell them to do, and it did not turn out well for them. So they have to listen to the doctor, you know. They really do.

And I think that sometimes when you can recount those things to a current patient, without mentioning details and names and all of that, but you can say, one time someone knew to do this, but they didn't do it, here was the result. I want to help prevent that for you. Exactly. Yeah. And that would be listening to what the doctor tells them to do, offloading the, it seems like offloading the wounded aperture is the biggest thing.

They seem to think that, well, you know, I can go ahead and do this, do that like I used to. I had a patient once, without saying names or whatever, that put a, I mean, kept the bandage on her wound, but wore high heels. Like, are you kidding me? You can't, you can't do that, you know? Yeah. And it's, it's, they just think they can just, it's not a, it's not a big deal. Well, it's not a big deal at this point, but it can become a very big, big deal later on. you don't want the wound to get bigger, you know, take care of it the way you're supposed to,

and let's prevent that wound from getting larger. You know, I have, I mean, I have specialties that I can use to definitely heal the wound, but it's very expensive, and CMS doesn't want me to use it until everything's been exhausted than we can use it at the end. But it's very expensive, and still, you have to listen to the doctor even after that's a supply. So let's just do it in the first place, you know, prevent all this from happening. Yeah, let's be most efficient. So I'm sure that you are not the only one in the country that does what you do.

What are some of the key points that sets you apart in providing your resources to your clients? Well, what we do is we really get involved with our clients and we, well, I would say we get involved with our doctors, mostly. and we try to promote our doctors as much as possible as being the expert in this field. And we talk to, like I said, different facilities that house our early population. So they know that this doctor is a specialist in this particular area. Because a lot of patients, if they have a problem, they'll Google, let's say a podiatrist. 20 podiaturists will show up. okay then they'll make sure they take their insurance that's the next thing you do okay which one's

the closest to my house or wherever i'm living and that's the one that's going to win you can't do that you know you got to pick the one that has the most experience in healing wounds takes your your insurance of course but distance to not make a difference because you need to go to a doctor that really knows what he's talking about, and he has a successful ratio of healing his patients completely. You know, and he's not afraid to take the hard cases, because a lot of doctors won't take anything overstage two. They're not going to take it.

They're going to refer to a wound care center. And a wound care center, they do a good job, but they don't do the best job because they don't have the best products. you know, not all the time. They may, but not all the time. You don't know which one of those has the best products. As a patient, you have no idea. How do you know?

You know, so that's what we try to do is educate our patients on, and potential patients on the doctors that we have because we know they have the best products in the industry. You know, I think that most people would say, look, I need a solution. I don't want to waste time. I don't want to run around in circles. show me the best way to accomplish what I need to accomplish, and I'm going to take that and move forward. So I think that is spectacular. You know, you mentioned in your introduction that you

started off in telecommunications and then we're in different industries, and now this is where your passion lies. Think back to the beginning of your entrepreneurial journey. Can you think of a failure or a breakdown that you experienced, maybe even personally or professionally, that you had to overcome, you know, get around, solve so that you can get to the next step in your entrepreneurial journey? Yeah, that was when I got involved with stem cell therapy. And I had, I had lots of patients ready to go. We were doing, we were doing like stem cell therapy and also, what were else was doing?

And it was, oh my God, what is it called? I haven't used it in so long. I don't even know it. I forgot the name of it. It was a fluid that we would use to accelerate healing in the body. And that's what the FDA shut that down and also stem cell therapy down. It was like. So you could have just gotten out of the whole industry at that point, but you kind of pivoted to find that.

there's a big need in the diabetic needs community. Yeah, I was, it, I mean, it nearly broke me when that happened because I had, I said everything into it, has three doctors ready to go, and helped actually three patients at that point. They got in under the, under the radar before the federal government shut it down. So they got help, but I had about another 80 more. and needed help. And it,

I mean, I lost everything. And so at that point, I was, yeah, I was more than broken. I was really, really,

in a bad condition right there. But I didn't give up. What did you do to keep, what did you do to keep persevering through that and not let it break you? Um, I just, I just took, I just took a step back and just looked at what I was doing.

And, and then, And I decided, what I didn't want to do was work for another company. And so I ended up doing that, working for another company in the medical industry. And then what happened is one of the, one of the reps that I was working with in the, in the fluid. I can't remember the name of the product. My goodness. in that industry referred me to another company as a go-getter,

and then they called me. And they offered me a position with them, and that's how I got my start. Yeah. And they explained what it was and the product and everything, totally different than what I was used to doing. They said, but with your tenacity, you'll figure it out. You know, and they were correct.

I saw, and I never thought about, diabetes is I didn't know anybody that had diabetes before them, or if I did know people, they didn't share that information with me, you know, but I learned how, how massive it was. It's a bad disease. Yeah. And the reason why you don't see people that have tremendous diabetes issues is because most of them stay home. They can't walk. They walk, and it's very painful for them.

So you don't see them all the time, you know. but the ones that have like type type one you see you see that but but it's just I didn't understand how big it was until I did my research and I thought wow yeah they need help right now because people that get diabetes and they have an issue and they get a like their ankle or their foot amputated or whatever or their leg their suicide rate or or let's say their terminal rate is right around about 60%. Wow. They just lose their, you know, interest in living.

Just all kinds of things happen and they just go backwards. And so I said, So at the time you were kind of dealing with that, you know, stem cell time where it almost broke you, how did Faith play a role in you having enough wits about you to see further down the road than what's in front of you. You didn't know that the diabetic solution was going to be part of where you're headed, but you just knew something else out there had to be out there where you're going to really dig your heels into.

Where did you go from there in developing that faith? Well, I was always, I was raised with a religious background when I was a kid anyway. So I definitely believe in God. but I know even bad things happen to good people, so that's what happening all through history. So I knew I shouldn't give up, you know, because I just, I knew I did not want to work for, you know, a 9 to 5 job.

I just can't do it. I just can't do it. And so I'd had to recreate myself. So fortunately, I, when I was a young man, I worked in construction for my friend's dad, and I was very good at it. I'm good at working with my hands. And so within that process of getting my mind right, I took some jobs doing construction, you know, because I still like to tinker with things and, you know, I'm good with roofing.

And it's just construction in general, interior work, things like that. And so I did that for a while, which gave me time to reflect, get my mind right and things like that. And it was a job where I wasn't committed to going and working nine to five. I worked when I wanted to because I worked for like a company that were calling me and say, hey, we got this job. Do you want it? And blah, blah, blah, blah. And that's what I wanted.

And so I said, let me just get some time, just get my mind right, get some money in my pocket. And then I said, okay, let's go for it. Let's do this one thing. Once they called me, I'm like, let's go for this. Let's do this one thing. And I just put everything I could into it. And I remember, that's one of I remembered Ray Perez and I got him involved and all that's it. I want to do this.

It's go. Let's go. Let's go. And now we're a very, very successful company. And we're helping a lot of people. And we have, we had a golf tournament. a while ago, and we also did some other things for the community, too, and we're just going to continue growing. We're expanding into the Midwest now, and also we're expanding out of Florida,

too, as well. So, awesome. So you learn from each lesson you learn from maybe a little hardship, and maybe even you can learn some lessons in the successes, and I think that is really cool. if you could go back and do things differently in any of those stages in your personal or professional career, would you make any changes or would you have everything to be done the same way that it has been? Well, I would say I'd probably just leave it the way it was. Of course, you wish you would have got into, you know, the membrane business, wound care business long time ago and forgot all about stem cell therapy, whatever. but I'm not sure I would have appreciated it as much as I do now. I'm not sure, you know. So I'm kind of glad I went through it.

It was extremely painful, of course. But it taught me to be very, very tenacious and also to become determined, become the person I need to be. And it's not just about my success. It's about just helping as many people as we can because I don't want to see people suffer. And that's been the biggest thing that I've learned when I was growing up in my faith is I don't like to see people suffer. And so if I can do something to help them to get better, feel better mentally and physically, I'm right there. I'm going to do it. You know, you mentioned tenacity, and that is just spectacular.

The attribute goes right along with persistence, you know, as we need to be persistent in moving forward. in our personal development, professional development, and you had to be a tenacious in your career. What do you think, in your opinion, are some more of the key attributes that other entrepreneurs need to be aware of and manage so that they can overcome some of those unforeseen issues? Well, I think if you do a little bit of reading, too, about, you know, I like to, there's a, there's a TV program and it's called stories or how America was built or whatever. And if you learn, you can learn a lot by watching these stories on how even these billionaires that were, I mean, decades and decades ago, how they got started. And they started from nothing.

I mean, just, I mean, just to see what they were doing. And you go, man, I got it easy. I got, I don't have to worry about where to live. I got water, I got clean water, clean clothes, I got this, I got that, you know, there should be nothing standing in my way, you know, and so that kind of helps promote me into a better frame of mind so that I can always be at my best and put my best out there because it's just not about me, it's about helping other people. But once I see what other people have done in the past become successful, man.

Then it becomes a problem. Then once you're successful, then you reach another set of problems, and that's how to stay successful and how to bless other people and things like that. So that's the problem. You shift your attention from growth and striving and growing to now giving back and thriving. When you get to that point of thriving and you can help other people and give back, that becomes that servant's attitude. That's awesome.

Yeah, yeah. And what I want to do is we are getting involved in some real estate ventures. We're going to help patients that have issues with wound care, whatever, to come to Florida and stay at one of our homes that we have. And then they can, I mean, at a reduced price, and it's going to have all the amenities. they need, things like that. But that way they can heal there, enjoy Florida. And it's a fun thing for them now. It's not, oh, my God, I'm just suffering here, whatever, and I can't do anything.

I want to change their mindset. So when they come here, they feel like they're on vacation. But, of course, they're still under the doctor's care, but they're seeing our doctor. They're seeing a doctor that knows their condition, knows how to take care of it. And he's the best in the field without. paying a huge premium over it. We can make sure their insurance is correct, this and that. We can take care of them and they're going to be fine.

So that's my next page that we're going to have and we're just closing on a home right now, actually, on the 16th that's going to allow us to do that. You know, Alfonso, you have come through just a lot of huge shifts in your career, made some huge successes, you're giving back, you've attained that pinnacle of, you've attain that pinnacle of, you know, struggle and now you're at the top of your career field, serving your clients. I'm sure you've learned lessons and that have actually led to solidifying your own purpose. I think that one of the layers beneath purpose is your why.

Can you articulate and explain what's your why that drives you? My, my why is to offer my children. I have a son and a daughter. and a avenue and a legacy that they can enjoy and build upon because they were in the medical industry. So I'm doing it not only for myself, but also for my kids, my grandkids, because nobody else did that for me. And so now I have this opportunity to leave a legacy for my children they can be absolutely proud of because I didn't have anything like that. like that, nothing. A legacy is just a spectacular gift.

I love that. So if someone is interested in learning a little bit more about what you do and reaching out and connecting with you, what's the best way that they can do that? They can go to Alfonso, A-L-F-O-N-Z-O-360.com. And they can see my posts there, my videos. They have a section called biomedicine. They can go to that as well to see what our products are. And if they have anybody that has a problem with wounds or burn victims, we work with burn victims too because we work with the skin.

We're going to replace skin and tissue. They need it. They need to contact us. We can definitely help them. Alfonso, thank you so much for coming on. It's been a real pleasure talking with you today. Thank you, sir. I appreciate you speaking with me, and I'm looking forward to working with you in the future as well.

You've been listening to Influential Entrepreneurs with Mike Saunders. To learn more about the resources mentioned on today's show or listen to past episodes, visit www.com.