Escaping Physician Exploitation: Private Practice, Pay Transparency, and Entrepreneurship with Dr. Brian Dixon

Key Podcast Moments

• Why the salary you’re offered is never the true number and how hospitals profit off your work.
• The biggest misconception doctors have about contracts and why “no contract is ever written in your favor.”
• Why transparency and fairness are the foundation of Dr. Dixon’s private practice model.
• The one piece of business coaching advice that cost him $50,000
• Why the grass isn’t greener somewhere else, it’s greener where you water it.

Dr. Brian Dixon is a psychiatrist, entrepreneur, and one of the boldest physician voices pushing for salary transparency and fairness in medicine. He’s the founder of Simply Psych and Mindful, and he’s built his career by pulling back the curtain on contracts, compensation, and the hidden math of how health systems profit off physicians. With radical honesty, he shares not just his wins but also his mistakes—showing doctors the real trade-offs between employment, private practice, and entrepreneurship.

On this episode of How I Doctor, Dr. Graham Walker talks with Brian about why most contracts are designed to exploit physicians, how transparency builds trust, and what it really takes to scale a practice without burning out. They dig into the myths that keep doctors underpaid, the psychological traps that make us easy to exploit, and the lessons Brian had to buy - sometimes for $50,000 - that can save you from the same fate. If you’ve ever wondered how to get paid fairly and keep your autonomy intact, this is the conversation you’ve been waiting for.

Thank you to our wonderful sponsors for supporting the podcast:

Abridge - AI for clinical conversations: https://www.abridge.com/

Evidently - Leading AI-powered clinical data intelligence https://evidently.com/

Top 4 Takeaways