Nancy Walker watched her mother change primary care doctors six times while struggling with cancer, as one practitioner after another left their rural New Mexico community. Nekisha Bailey knew people in her hometown of Detroit who had given up on healthcare because they felt misunderstood by their doctors. Michelle Von Der Heyde saw patients in Miami with terminal illness who were receiving the best care available, yet they still experienced a lack of understanding from their medical team about the emotional toll the illness was having on them.
All of them thought: There’s something wrong here. What can I do to be part of the solution?
Walker, Bailey and Von Der Heyde are nurse practitioners (NPs), and each of them was looking for a way to fill a healthcare need that they saw going unaddressed. For all three, the answer was to start their own practice on their home turf.
They’re not the only ones. Nurse practitioner is the third fastest-growing occupation in the U.S., according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, and the number of nurse practitioners is expected to increase by 40% between 2024 and 2034. Over the same 10-year period, the number of physicians and surgeons is expected to grow by only 3%.
“That stat points to a not-so-subtle shift in healthcare, as NPs emerge as an essential solution to a growing problem,” says Michele Morgan, Director of Nursing Initiatives at Johnson & Johnson. “There has been a decline of primary care providers, and nurse practitioners have really stepped in to help fill that gap.”
Indeed, as the healthcare needs of an aging population increase, NPs are trained to take on many of the same tasks as primary care physicians: They must have a degree at the master’s level or higher and they can be certified in various specialties. That advanced training allows them to prescribe tests and medications, diagnose illnesses and perform certain procedures.
But there is more work to be done to connect the burgeoning numbers of NPs to the communities where they are needed most, says Morgan.
To that end, the Johnson & Johnson Foundation has partnered with Duke Health, at the Duke University School of Medicine, to create the Nurse Practitioner Entrepreneur Program (NPEP), a year-long hybrid experience that combines business training, executive coaching and mentorship to help NPs launch their own practices in underserved communities across the country.
Championing nurse leadership through programs like NPEP is core to J&J CareCommunity, the global social impact platform focusing the efforts of Johnson & Johnson and the Johnson & Johnson Foundation to support nurses to lead, innovate and transform healthcare.
“Nurse practitioners have incredible clinical expertise, but one of the things they often don’t have is the business know-how to figure out how to set up a practice,” says Morgan.
The success of the program can be seen in the stories of the three NPs below who all graduated from NPEP’s inaugural class in 2025. “Being in a room with people who had a dream just like me was invaluable,” says Bailey.
Read on to learn what inspired each of them to pursue a career as an NP, how they’re meeting the needs of patients in their communities and their advice for other would-be NPs pursuing a similar path.
Combining high tech with high touch
Michelle Von Der Heyde
Miami, FL
Her practice: Von Der Heyde’s clinic, MindRefined, treats mental health and psychiatric conditions ranging from depression and anxiety to obsessive compulsive disorder, eating disorders, ADHD, bipolar disorder and what’s known as psycho-oncology (mental health care for cancer patients).
“We have a philosophy of holistic care, getting at the root of a patient’s suffering,” Von Der Heyde says. Her approach combines functional psychiatry—looking at the metabolic, nutritional and genetic factors driving symptoms—with cutting-edge technology to enhance and guide treatment.
What inspired her to become a nurse practitioner: Growing up in Venezuela, Von Der Heyde dreamed of a career in the medical field. After moving to South Florida, she began her journey as a certified nursing assistant before becoming a registered nurse and specializing in oncology. She then went on to become an advanced practice registered nurse, eventually achieving a triple certification in family medicine, oncology and psychiatry.
“In many Latin American cultures, nursing is often perceived as a supporting role to the physician,” says Von Der Heyde. “In the U.S., however, I found that nurses are the core of the healthcare system—empowered to lead, innovate and provide the holistic care that patients need.”
She decided to pursue NP training in the U.S. to “blend clinical expertise with the nursing philosophy of seeing the patient as a whole, ultimately building a bilingual practice that serves the diverse communities of South Florida.”
When she was accepted into NPEP she was already in the process of starting her practice. But she still had plenty to learn about the business side of things. “The program, with its marketing and strategic tools, helped me ask, ‘Who is being left behind?’ The first gap I identified was in the oncology population,” she says.
A typical day as a nurse practitioner: Von Der Heyde has a nonnegotiable morning routine, beginning her day with a yoga session or a walk with her dogs, followed by a good breakfast. As she says, “I can’t ask my patients to prioritize their health if I’m not willing to walk that path myself.”
At the clinic, she and her team review data gathered from patient exams—lab results, metrics on sleep and stress from wearable smart devices, analyses of inflammation and gut health—before she meets with patients, whether that’s in person or virtually. Depending on the patient, her sessions include a mix of DNA-guided medication management, talk therapy and lifestyle coaching.
“I call it a forensic analysis on a case, so when I’m ready to see the patient, I’m fully prepared before I even speak,” says Von Der Heyde.
What sets her practice apart: Von Der Heyde’s holistic approach to treating mental health issues utilizes a mix of high touch and high tech.
For instance, when she’s meeting a patient to hear about their symptoms—whether it’s panic attacks, depression or the effects of trauma or a life transition—she’s also able to integrate information about the possible biological underpinnings, which could be genomics, nutritional status or data from wearable tech.
“We aren’t always the most reliable narrators of our own stories,” she says. Wearables that continuously monitor sleep, activity and physiological stress markers can help fill in the information gaps.
Say, for instance, a patient with bipolar disorder has suddenly gone from 4,000 steps a day to 15,000. “That data could serve as an early warning sign of a manic episode,” says Von Der Heyde.
“When I can explain to a patient that it may be their biology or their DNA that’s dictating some of their challenges, that’s a powerful moment,” she adds. “They realize it’s not their fault.”
She is also using technology to bridge the gap between the exam room and the billing office. “Automating this administrative heavy lifting is crucial,” she says. “It handles the logistics so that when I step into my role as a provider, I can give my patients 100% of my presence.”
Her advice for nurse practitioners just starting out: “Know what you don’t know, and don’t be afraid to ask questions,” says Von Der Heyde. She also encourages NPs to take the entrepreneur route: “Advanced NPs are the solution to so many gaps in healthcare. We’re a key player.”
Meeting patients where they are
Nekisha Bailey
Detroit, MI
Her practice: Bailey will open her practice, SAM Total Wellness Solutions, in Detroit this spring. Her vision is to provide “an integrated health approach, a one-stop shop” to address what she calls fragmented care across multiple providers, specialists and settings.
“Before I started NPEP, all I really knew was that I wanted a clinic,” says Bailey. “But I didn’t have the business acumen at all, and that’s what the program helped me with—how to be realistic, become organized and go through things with a fine-toothed comb. It was like I was given a road map. By the end of the program, I had completed a whole business plan.”
Her clinic aims to provide primary care services for all age groups. But Bailey expects the treatment of substance abuse to become a large part of her practice—the SAM in the clinic’s name stands for Substance Abuse and Mental Health—using what’s known as medication-assisted treatment (combining behavioral therapies with pharmacological approaches).
What inspired her to become a nurse practitioner: “My childhood experiences fueled my desire to become a nurse,” says Bailey, whose mother suffered from mental illness and drug abuse and spent time in and out of jail.
Bailey ended up in foster care before moving in with her grandmother. “My brother and I had a lot of childhood trauma—abuse, poverty, homelessness,” she says. “But I learned from my foster mother what nurturing and love look like and discovered that I had the ability to nurture others and instill hope. I told my brother I was going to take care of him.”
What sets her practice apart: “Detroit is plagued with unaddressed mental health issues and poverty,” says Bailey. It makes a difference, she says, for her patients “to have a provider that they can identify with.” A big part of her goal: to create a “judgment-free zone” for her patients to receive treatment.
One way Bailey plans to meet patients where they are is with the aid of a specially equipped mobile unit—essentially a healthcare clinic on wheels—that will allow her to reach people across the city who might otherwise go without medical care.
“We’re going to be boots on the ground,” she says. “We don’t want anything to be a barrier to people accessing care.”
Her advice for nurse practitioners just starting out: “Before you start your training, know your ‘why,’” says Bailey. “Do you want to be a servant of your community, and a change agent? You will need empathy and patience.”
Providing hometown healthcare
Nancy Walker
Ruidoso and Roswell, NM
Her practice: Walker runs two family practice clinics in rural New Mexico not far from where she grew up, an area that has long suffered from gaps in healthcare due to provider turnover. Through a unique partnership with an affiliated medical spa, both of her clinics offer aesthetic treatments, like facials and Botox injections, which helps to fund the family practice.
“There’s been a revolving door of practitioners—physicians come in, work to pay off their student loans and then leave,” says Walker. “We needed something stable in the community.”
What inspired her to become a nurse practitioner: Walker first pursued nursing as a young mom; the flexible schedule was conducive to raising children. But she found she loved the work and when the nest was empty, she raised her sights to higher education.
“I wanted to be a nurse practitioner and try to really change healthcare,” she says. During her NP training she worked—and found mentors—at an independent family practice in Roswell, which she ended up buying at the same time she was building her own clinic 75 miles away in Ruidoso.
“I was worried that I’d be spread too thin, but the experts in the NPEP program encouraged me to jump into having two locations,” says Walker.
A typical day as a nurse practitioner: Walker spends a day and a half seeing patients at the Roswell practice and the rest of the week at the newer clinic in Ruidoso. There, she oversees services provided at the medical spa but spends the better part of the day at the family practice seeing patients of all ages with conditions ranging from diabetes and hypertension to hormone imbalances, and she offers wellness exams and preventive screenings.
Her workday begins at 3 a.m. so she can tend to the business side of running two clinics. She has learned to be flexible and roll with the punches that come with being an entrepreneur. For instance, when New Mexico unexpectedly imposed new certification requirements for providing medical spa services, Walker scrambled to do the extra training and take the required certification exam.
“My mentor at NPEP said that when you’re an entrepreneur, it’s like you’re on this journey, and then sometimes mid-flight you hit headwinds and you have to create a new flight plan,” she says. “My whole business model was built around the med spa bringing in funds for the clinic, so I had to pivot and do the extra training.”
What sets her practice apart: “The cash flow from the medical spa allows me to commit to spending a minimum of 30 minutes with each patient,” says Walker. “In traditional healthcare, the provider often wants to treat the patient’s presenting complaint and move them along. My goal is to meet them where they are, including considering alternative approaches. So I sit with the patient and listen—I don’t ever type notes into my computer while we’re talking.”
Walker also actively mentors other NPs in the community, including some who are doing their clinical rotations at her clinic, guiding them on how to start their own NP-run practice.
Her advice for nurse practitioners just starting out: “Be open to thinking outside the box, to doing things differently, to hearing what your patient is telling you,” she advises. “Don’t be so locked in that you only want to deliver care in one particular way.”
