Today we’d like to introduce you to Briana Juskowiak.
Hi Briana, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
My clinic journey began in the throes of insomnia. And the inability to finish a sentence or get off the couch at 3pm. And a complete lack of sex drive (like zero). And four, yep four, steroid injections in my hip to address ongoing joint pain. Somewhere in all that it occurred to me this was not just “aging.” And even if it was it sucked beyond reason. Thus began my personal search for an answer – which I found on my own – and was then followed by the search for someone who would fix the problem. Problem, meet brick wall. Ugh the frustration that is trying to find a provider who will actually listen, validate, and ultimate treat what I was coming to believe were the throes of peri-menopause. The first night I took Progesterone I cried because it was the first time I felt naturally tired, and was able to sleep, in two years. I had forgotten what it felt like to just live your life without all the aforementioned symptoms. The power of this – treating a condition’s root cause changed my life and ultimately led me to open my own practice.
My career story began four score and seventeen years ago (jk it was 2000 actually) in the ER at Grady and let me tell you to this day those two years have remained the best stories of my entire career. Grady is the best of times and the worst of times. I worked as a RN for 15 years in ER, ICU, home health, and palliative medicine. I then became a critical care nurse practitioner and still practice part time in the ICU – I can’t seem to give it up. I love the life and death intervention ICU offers and it’s an honor to be a part of someone’s hour of greatest need. But eventually covid burnout hit and I went through the aforementioned personal medical journey which led me to the desire to do more than just save lives. Now I get to help people thrive.
I opened Alpha Wellness Clinic in July of 2024 and what a fun ride it’s been! I get to live vicariously through my patients every day. Their successes and joy feed my soul.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
There were many, believe you me. I’m sure there are entrepreneurs out there who just fall into success but for me the building steps were arduous. It took two years to accumulate funds as I didn’t want to borrow money for startup costs. Then I met roadblock after roadblock in meeting the regulatory conditions required by the board of medicine and the DEA, which I do not deny are important steps. Then there were issues finding a collaborating doctor. By the time all that was sorted out the geographic area I had planned on opening in had several competitors so I had to expand my location search. But here’s where the magic happened. I believe that all things work out as they are supposed to and within failures or perceived setbacks there is a season of growth. And sometimes, the universe needs time to arrange things like they are meant to be in order to offer you the life experience you need. For me this came in the form of divine help. The small town of Jefferson is far from where I live, it’s tiny, and I knew no one in that area. But the perfectly sized space opened up in this area where there was no competition. I went to see the space and while perusing the area I realized the cottage directly across from mine was rented by a dear college friend who just the year prior had opened a boutique. It was all the confirmation I needed! What a blessing she has turned out to be. In 2025 I went through a divorce, moved, healed my heart, had a spiritual awakening, ruptured a lumbar disc, couldn’t walk for two months, and had surgery. There is no way my business could have survived without her, and many others’ help. Isn’t it magical how God knows what you need long before you do? I’ve learned to trust the process, the twists of life are perfectly arranged to create the experience I’m meant to have and there is always always beauty in pain or hardships if you just focus on it.
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I run a small medical clinic that offers hormone replacement and medical weight loss therapy. I offer standard hormone optimization for andropause, menopause, and other sub foci such as management of PCOS and thyroid conditions. I take people from a place of “not feeling like themselves anymore” and return them to youthful vigor. Hormone imbalance affects every part of your body from your head to your toes and tends to be a pervasive; insidious onset of problems that go unnoticed until the cumulative effects make daily life too difficult to remain unaddressed. Unfortunately in typical medical practice hormones go largely under acknowledged and often invalidated as an etiology for the patient’s pain points. That is because the specialty is not well taught in school nor is it reimbursed properly by insurance carriers. So we end up with an epidemic of middle aged folks (primarily) who are managing a very treatable condition with a host of home pharmaceuticals that offer, at best, band aid remedies. I see nearly miraculous recoveries every day and it is the most rewarding work! I often receive messages of “you’ve saved my marriage” and “I haven’t felt this good in twenty years.” Imagine running a business that pays your bills AND helps so many people – it’s truly a dream.
Do you have recommendations for books, apps, blogs, etc?
Hmm where to start? I am a voracious consumer of knowledge and the gamut of my interests is always expanding. Classic must reads – The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle; Many Lives, Many Masters by Brian Weiss; Single on Purpose by John Kim; The Premonition by Michael Lewis or if you want straight up entertainment, Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt.
For Podcasts I love The Huberman Lab, The School of Greatness, and (yes the O.G.) Alex Cooper’s Call Her Daddy.
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