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Who is Dr Anna Zickerman? Can you explain a little bit more about your background?
I am a Swedish born, Dubai raised, mother of 4 gorgeous girls aged between 10-25 years. Some call me a determined workaholic, others a hardworking perfectionist; but most recognise the selfless dedicated entrepreneur in me that has a desire to create and grow a service that everyone can benefit from, with the level of care and standards people deserve.
Dr Anna Zickerman, Founder and Managing Director, UPANDRUNNING
As a sports enthusiast, having had a fantastic youth in Dubai, being Head Girl at Dubai College in 1988-89, I always intended returning to set up my own Sports Clinic once I had completed my extensive training in the UK. My parents, brother and his family remained true to Dubai throughout. For us, this was always our ‘home’. Unfortunately, it took me a little longer to return after University than what was originally planned, as Sports Medicine introduced Sports Medicine as a subspeciality in the late 90’s, it only formally became recognised as a speciality in the UK in 2005. By this point I had already created my own rotation and worked my way around most of the relevant specialities. I had also worked closely with professional teams and covered a variety of sporting events to gain the experience and training I felt was required to ensure I could fully support the active population of any age and competence. I was extremely fortunate that my journey contributed to a wealth of knowledge and extensive experience that influenced the creation of an ambitious business plan of a home grown start-up of a fully integrated, ethical, evidence based, professional, Sports and Exercise Medicine Clinic I had dreamt of. In 2006 I was now finally heading back home….
I am extremely fortunate to have had the opportunity to see Dubai grow and evolve since its inception in the early 70’s. We first lived on the outskirts, looking out into desert dunes just south of what is now the new creek extension and Safa Park. I recall seeing the iconic Trade Centre on the horizon, my father driving to work through the desert, crossing Sheikh Zayed Road’s 2 lanes as if it was a dirt track and listening to my father’s VHF radio as the Gulf War broke out with smoke coming off the horizon as tankers were hit. Life as a child was fun and simple, yet exciting. I always felt safe and protected.
Transforming from a desert town to one of the most popular cities in the world within one generation does pose its challenges. Yet here I am today, 44 years later, still settled. I am enjoying the new lifestyle Dubai has to offer; it is just somewhat more sophisticated.
UPANDRUNNING is today a very successful business – can you explain how it got to where it is today?
Let me give you a common scenario:
We all live in a society that lends itself to constant pressure. From work, family, friends and in particular from social media. Our lifestyle is stressful, often resulting in us sitting still for long hours in compromised positions and often making up for this through explosive, erratic exercising. We all get aches and pains, we all get injuries, we are all concerned when symptoms hamper our routine. Assuming the worst, Dr Google confirms the most horrendous conditions. Our friends then give us their take on it and tell us to book in with the therapist they saw the year before…. The problem here is that it is difficult to tell what is right or wrong other than when you realise you have wasted lots of time and money (yours or that of the insurance company) on sessions with no improvement.
What you have the right to expect is for someone to listen to you attentively, examine you properly, then outline exactly what your issue is, explaining the reasoning behind it. They can then offer a realistic solution to resolve it, taking into account your lifestyle, commitments and expectations. Why do lots of tests when the diagnosis is obvious? This is the western way. It is our way.
While I must admit that I was a bit naïve when I started off, I had a vision, I knew what I wanted to achieve and had allocated a substantial amount of personal funding to make it happen. Doctors are not trained on how to run a business. It was a case of learning by trial and error and sometimes making costly mistakes. I relied on my managers to manage the running of the clinic so I could work with clinicians as part of an integrated approach, network with colleagues and come up with new opportunities. It was all quite erratic to start with as we tested our way forward. Managers came and went, each with their own agenda. I ended up investing all my reserves; mortgaging my house, and taking hefty loans; committed, determined and believing that what we were doing would one day prove itself worthy. Throughout, there was never any compromise on standards or care; always employing very experienced western trained clinicians to support our ethical practice and continue to provide a reliable, evidence-based clinical service. I just had to find a way that did not constantly break the bank.
I recently found a fantastic Management Team and also have a great sounding board to work with, all whom fully understand my vision and can help direct us to achieve this. I appreciate the importance of creating a realistic business plan with a proper strategy, and also the benefit of creating and tracking KPIs. With this properly in place, for the first time in nearly 10 years I was finally able to let go of the back of the end business and do what I enjoy best; focus on patient care and yet still be in the center of any serious business discussions and decision making.
Anna in front of the DIFC clinic
Background:
UPANDRUNNING Integrated Medical Center finally opened its doors 10 years ago in September 2010 in Umm Suqeim with six employees. Having had a number of branches, our main clinic remains central on the Al Wasl Road, with branches at Emirates Golf Club and DIFC. Today we are over 50 employees across the three sites. We pride ourselves in our consistent reputation and strong brand, which we have worked extremely hard to build over the years. 75% of our patients are purely from recommendations. This is a milestone worth celebrating.
UPANDRUNNING is founded on 3 pillars: Treat, Train and Teach and this approach is practiced throughout. We have successfully transformed lives by taking the time to listen to what people have to say, creating a realistic treatment plan with progression reviews, making sure we always address the cause and not only the symptoms, and offer education and detailed explanations along the way.
Our team comprises of sports medicine specialists, family medicine specialists, orthopaedic surgeons, physiotherapists, osteopaths, chiropractors, sports massage therapists, Sports nutritionists, Sports Science and Performance Specialists and nurses.
From the infirm and unfit, those wanting to achieve, the injured or those suffering in pain; as an established integrated sports and family medicine clinic, we can offer something for everyone.
Our approach is simple: We start conservative and if this does not demonstrate a good enough response, then we step things up and start to intervene or investigate. Surgery is the absolute last resort.
Although our aim is to keep people active throughout their treatment as best we can, we do sometimes have to negotiate and suggest alternative exercises whilst allowing the body to heal.
Anna and her team worked with the PGA European Tour for 10 years covering all their regional events working closely with the players, their families and staff.
UPANDRUNNING is recognised as one of 5 Professional Golfer’s Association, European Tour accredited clinics globally, having covered their events regionally for the last 10 years. We have also gained international recognition by many other European professional travelling teams and have athletes as well as non-athletes travelling from the whole MENA region to see us.
We have completed nearly half a million patient encounters over this 10-year period including all the events we have covered. We are averaging 120 patients a day across the 3 sites, with 8% of these being new patients. We proudly have a large cohort of loyal patients that have been returning with friends and family since our inception. At UPANDRUNNING we do not accept that there is no solution and go out of our way to find it.
With a strong, enthusiastic team we have won a number of prestigious awards over the years but the last one was the most honourable;
The Health Awards 2019. I won the title of “Distinguished Leader in Healthcare”, gaining recognition for all my efforts in driving the speciality forwards, introducing new categories and services, and working closely with the Dubai Health Authority.
Anna awarded the Distinguished Leader of the Year at the 2019 Health Awards. The prize was presented by His Excellency Humaid Al Qutami
What were the main challenges in opening your own business?
It was never a bed of roses. The beauty of remaining a single owner means that decisions can be made much faster, but so can mistakes. This autonomy has however allowed us to easily adapt to the needs or demands of our population.
With a growing entity; up to 64 employees at one point, the pressure was constant. Each step forward has been met with its own resistance. Setting up a new service in a developing country that was rapidly evolving with changing regulations was challenging, to say the least. There have been painful setbacks, costly mistakes, back-stabbing from assumed loyal colleagues and poaching from bigger players.
Anna´s daughters, Mia, Sofi, Ella and Evie
Like any other entrepreneur here in the same time era, I have no doubt there are many stories that one can share that others will neither believe nor comprehend. It has to always be about the ‘how’ not the ‘if’ to get things done; to persist and never give up, is something my mother inspired in me.
Now that we have far better structure and stability, I can look back and smile, feeling enriched with experience. I am thankful to still be standing and confident with our achievement. Like-minded people will share the feeling of success when they too have been part of a transition, and helped pave the way for others to follow.
Despite the difficult journey, I would not change anything from the past. What life has put me through has made me into the person I am today. I feel stronger, yet calmer and more confident. Although I am passionate about what I do, I also recognise that having one’s own business does detract from consistent quality parenting. More so being a single mother with shared care. I have however always made time to attend as many school events and out of school activities as I can, recognising how awe-inspiring it is to watch my children perform and nurture their opportunities to shine. Family holidays are varied and chosen wisely to allow for much needed and shared downtime.
We all want to live a healthy life, but can you give us your 5 top tips that one should think about on a day to day?
Technique is key:
We all want to look great and feel great. This takes time and effort. There is no quick fix. Not everyone has the time they want to spend in the gym for example, so people need to be more efficient and effective with what they do. This means choosing the right type of exercise, number of reps, sets, tempo and training split as well as using the right tools correctly. Many compromise technique: allowing them to feel good about the increase in load, whereas what they are actually doing is increasing the risk of injury.
To maximise potential, you need to perform every exercise correctly even if it means reducing the load initially. If unsure then please connect with a personal trainer that is prepared to go over your aspirations and develop a specific programme suited to your requirements and demonstrate each exercise to you properly.
Dietary advice:
Diet has become a messy business as many turn to eliminating foods and whole food groups. There are three key points to a healthy diet:
1) Eat a variety of foods from all 5 food groups. If anyone is eliminated, then take advice on what may be missing
2) Calories do count when you are wanting to achieve a weight goal
3) Your diet needs to be planned and consistent. Taking pot-luck too often takes you out of the driver’s seat.
Returning from Exercise Abstinence:
Do not expect your body to pick up from where it was after prolonged rest from exercise.
Muscles start to atrophy already after 2-3 weeks of rest. Anything longer than that will cause progressive loss in strength and endurance. Although we have good muscle memory and can often quite quickly return to pre-existing fitness levels, our body still requires time to adapt and adjust to change in order to minimise the risk of injury. On top of that remember that muscles can stiffen and even shorten with sitting for prolonged periods, especially without any exercise, hence make sure you stretch the relevant muscle groups before undertaking exercise in particular the long muscles such as the hamstrings and the hip flexors.
Listen to your body:
No pain no gain?? If you are allowing pain or stiffness to stop you from doing what you really want, then make sure you have had the right checks and advice before giving up. Many such symptoms can be resolved by making simple adjustments, changing your technique, correcting muscle recruitment patterns and by generally understanding your body much better.
Focus on posture:
A poor posture can lend itself to a multitude of aches and pains from your neck down, via your shoulders all the way to your lower back when sitting. A very basic principal to consider to improve posture is increasing the distance between your belly button and the base of your chest/sternum. Suddenly you will feel your shoulders shifting backwards, opening up your chest, your back stretching out and neck actually sitting on your body rather than ‘hinging off it’. This is a far more neutral position and helps protect you from injury long term.
Thank you Anna for sharing your story with us - we wish you all the best of success in the future.
For more information about Dr Anna Zickerman click here.
To book an appointment call 04 518 5400, email info@upandrunningdubai.com or register an enquiry on our website www.upandrunningdubai.com.
Life is full of opportunities even like a kiss from a giraffe! (Anna receiving a kiss from a giraffe, Giraffe Manor in Nairobi before heading off on a safari)