MEET OUR TEAM

David Zahaluk M.D.
Founder & President

Dr. Zahaluk has been in primary care in the Dallas, Texas area since 1998. He has practiced clinical medicine since 1991 both in Canada and the United States. He is the founder of Ultimate Practice Builder, a firm dedicated to helping doctors reconnect with their practices, create better workflow and organizational structure, and increase their satisfaction levels.

His vision is to change the way allopathic medicine is practiced in the US by helping physicians regain a sense of control of their practices and their lives. The mission of Ultimate Practice Builder is to bring physicians to the top 10% of their specialty – in terms of quality indicators, income and time off – within 3 years… guaranteed.

Dr. Zahaluk has uncovered universally accepted and effective business principles, applied them to his primary care medical practice and organized his physician practice management techniques so other physicians can use them as well.

Medical School

PostGraduate Training

Board Certification

Professional Societies

Professional Information
Dr. Zahaluk is a lively and engaging speaker with broad appeal to diverse audiences from healthcare delivery to entrepreneurship in medicine. He has great passion for his subject matter and presents the unique perspective of both a dedicated clinician and a highly successful entrepreneur.

Rodger Blaker
Strategic Practice Development Coordinator

If you are ready to go after what you really want in your practice, Rodger Blaker is the individual to help you create that success. Rodger specializes in the operational and team building aspect of Ultimate Practice Builder.

One of Rodger’s key result areas is to create a management infrastructure in your practice. Put more directly… you probably have an office manager, but how well do you manage that manager?

An effective business team is organized around key strategic objectives. It is the manager’s responsibility to keep the whole operation on time and on target. Most practices are vulnerable in this position. By clarifying business objectives and priorities, empowering the manager with the necessary cutting-edge resources and skill sets and by keeping the manager accountable, Rodger transforms managers into real leaders.

Rodger has over 25 years of experience in the corporate world acting as a project manager and an operations director. He brings the proven practices of the Fortune 100 world into your office, without trying to redefine your culture.

Rodger is very aware of the importance of the culture and the trust that is needed to create a truly great office. He has developed a proven coaching process that will help your staff operate more strategically, with increased focus and a greater sense of satisfaction and balance in their work life.

Karen Newton

Strategic Practice Development Coordinator

Karen holds an MBA from the University of North Carolina. She has more than fifteen years experience in the business world within a Fortune 100 company where she rapidly advanced. She’s a real connector that brings people together on every project.

Karen is adept at implementing and fine tuning the systems of a practice. According to Karen the difference between a good practice and a great practice is how clearly they define their processes. It doesn’t matter if it is your hiring process or your refill policy – Karen can help you turn chaos into precision – and really decrease your stress in the process.

Steve Melton
CPA

Steve is our renaissance man. He is a former Dallas police office, former president of 3 different banks and now full time CPA specializing in professional practices. He also is a martial arts expert. How’s that for welll-rounded? He provides a specialized review of the P+L monthly that is necessary to track revenue increase and the associated expenses – absolute key to staying on track. He also helps to package the clients financials to make them more likely to get bank financing. He is working with Ultimate Practice Builder on a proprietary software program that will tie together the billing and the accounts payable sides of a practice in real time to create an electronically generated P+L statement.

It’s only when you know your practice numbers like the back of your hand that you will start to see major improvements in your cash flow? Why? Because every decision you make has a financial impact on your practice. It’s very hard to make good decisons blindly. Steve is here to help you attain financial clarity so you can make smart, strategic business decisions.

Veronica Rodriguez
Billing Coordinator

Have you ever wished you had someone in your office that could really stand up to the insurance companies? Someone who would quickly and persistently rebut their denials? Someone who wouldn’t take no for an answer?

And someone who would work with your front office to improve the process of insurance verification so that 95% of claims would go out clean and come back in less than 30 days as real money? Well then you must meet Veronica. She does precisely that.

James Christensen
Practice Strategist

James is the newest member of our team. He is a former hospital adminsitrator who now helps Ultimate Practice Builder service our billing clients. He has years of experience as VP of billing and collections with a large hospital system. We are grateful that he lends us his insight and experience to expand and grow our clients practices.

Gretchin Castro
Project coordinator and patient contact database support.

Gretchin provides key operational support for many of our proprietary marketing and publicity projects. She is an extremely valuable yet behind-the-scenes member of our team. Gretchin maintains high energy and enthusiasm and her attitude is contagious.

Wade Clapsaddle
HR Management Support

One of the newest features we have added at Ultimate Practice Builder is a first-clas HR and benefits package available to the smallest of practices. You can’t have the ultimate practice without great people on your team. Yet how can you compete with the large practices and hospital systems to attract quality personnell if they have a better benefits package? Wade has helped us even the playing field for our clients.

Wade has been in the HR field for over a decade. He has helped us bring a package to our clients that provides first class medical/dental/vision coverage, along with STD/LTD/Life insurance coverage and 401K for a very affordable rate.

But here’s the difference: Lots of small practice get medical benefits at a reasonable rate when they first apply only to see the rates skyrocket when a staff member has a major claim or even at the first renewal. Then they have to decide whether to drop coverage or get eaten alive by the outrageous rates. Wade has gotten us the abiliity to ensure our client we will see no more than a nominal increase every time they renew their benefits package. That’s a huge step forward in cost containment for a lot of smaller practices.

Plus Wade has a very dry sense of humor that makes him a pleasure to deal with.