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Hi, I'm

Dr. Cary Yurkiw, DC

Take the time off. Your practice keeps running.

I've been covering other chiropractors' practices since 1993, in more than eighty clinics, many of them busy high-volume offices. Patients stay adjusted, care plans stay on track, and revenue keeps coming in while you're away.

I work inside your systems, your software and your schedule rather than rewriting them. Available for vacation, parental and medical leave, conference weeks, and short-notice absences.

Β 

33
Years in Practice
80+
Clinics Worked In
100,000+
Adjustments Delivered

How I got here

Not the path I planned. The one that taught me the most.

1993–96
The Locum Years

Straight out of CMCC I covered other people's practices. Over a hundred locum weeks in more than fifty clinics, in three years.

Then
A Business

I trained other chiropractors, built a professional employment agency, expanded it into dentistry and medicine, and sold it.

Since
Tutt Street

I moved to British Columbia, did locums again, and opened my own clinic in Kelowna. I've owned it for twenty-five years.

The Short Version

I've made most of the mistakes already.

I graduated from CMCC in 1993 and spent my first three years covering other people's practices. I saw the inside of more clinics in three years than most chiropractors see in a career, and the pattern was hard to miss. The practices that worked and the ones that didn't were rarely separated by clinical skill.

That turned into a business. I trained other chiropractors, built a professional employment agency, then expanded it past chiropractic into dentistry and medicine. I eventually sold it to one of my own employees.

Then I moved to British Columbia, did locums again, and opened Tutt Street Family Chiropractic. I've owned it for twenty-five years, and I still adjust patients four days a week. I'm not coaching from the sidelines.

None of that was on the curriculum. School taught me how to treat. Nobody taught me how to run a business, hire a team, set a fee, or go home without carrying the schedule around in my head. My first decade nearly cost me the career, and the reason was simple once I saw it. I had no direction, so every open hour looked like an hour I should be working.

What fixed it wasn't working harder. It was building systems that held the practice up whether or not I was having a good week. Care plans that made sense to patients. A front desk that didn't need rescuing. Numbers I actually looked at. None of it was clever. All of it was repeatable.

The business side of this profession is learnable. It is not a mystery you were supposed to be born knowing.

“It took me far too long to build a practice that could survive me being away from it. That's the mistake I'd most like to save somebody else.”

What I Do Now

Three ways I work with people.

One profession, three different problems. Whichever one you're carrying, start where it fits.

Practice Growth

Coaching for doctors, therapists and clinic owners. Systems, workflow, numbers, and the leadership part nobody covers in school.

Practice growth →

Locum Coverage

I've covered other chiropractors' practices since 1993, in more than eighty clinics. Your systems, your software, your care plans. The practice keeps running.

Locum services →

Health Coaching

For people who are exhausted, have been dismissed, and are still looking for a straight answer about their energy.

Health coaching →
Speaking

Talks for students and new graduates

I speak about the practice that surrounds the treatment room. I've guest lectured at Northeast College of Health Sciences and Northwestern Health Sciences University, and taught quarterly at Herzing College for years. I started my own career as a locum, built a business out of it, and sold it — so when I tell students there's more than one path, I'm not speculating.

  • The Missing Semester Everything about building a practice that school never taught you.
  • The Locum Path How covering other people's practices lets you learn faster than your classmates and stay out of debt while you do it.
  • From Degree to Direction Why credentials aren't a plan, and how to build one that fits the life you want.
  • Trust Over Fear How fear-driven decisions produce short-term compliance and long-term drift, in a body or in a business.
  • Longevity in a Health Career What still works in decade three, and what burns people out before decade one is finished.

Keynote 45–60 min  ·  Workshop 90 min to half day  ·  Panel or Q&A  ·  In person or online

For event organizers

Everything you need to confirm a date, in one place.

Enquire About a Date
Writing

Thirty-one titles, one source.

Six are about building and running a practice. The rest are patient education and health coaching. I also publish a weekly article and co-host a video podcast recorded at the clinic. All of it comes from the same place — what I've watched work over three decades, and what I've watched fail.

  • The Missing Semester — everything about building a practice that school never taught you
  • Success in Private Practice — grow your practice and your life
  • The Freedom Practice Blueprint — break free from debt and design a life you actually want
  • The Wounded Healer — why doctors and therapists burn out, and how to come back
From a Colleague

What clinic owners say

“Dr. Cary has taken over my practice on several occasions. The clinic is busy and we use a number of techniques — he fit in seamlessly, and my staff loved working with him. I will use his services again.”

Dr. James Whillans, DC · Lifeworks Chiropractic

Before you get in touch

The things organizers and clinic owners ask first.

Are you still in practice? +

Yes. I adjust patients four days a week at Tutt Street Family Chiropractic in Kelowna, and I've owned that practice for twenty-five years. Everything I teach is something I'm still doing, not something I did once and now sell. If a system doesn't survive contact with a real schedule and real patients, I don't recommend it.

What makes your practice advice different? +

I've worked inside more than eighty clinics. Most practice coaches have seen one practice up close, their own, and are extrapolating from there. Three years of full-time locum work at the start of my career, and occasional coverage ever since, means I've watched eighty different versions of this business succeed and fail. That's a considerably larger sample than one.

Do you speak to student groups? +

Regularly, and it's the work I enjoy most. I've guest lectured at Northeast College of Health Sciences and Northwestern Health Sciences University, and taught quarterly at Herzing College for years. Send me your dates, your audience and how long you'd like. The one-sheet above has formats and topics, and I'm happy to shape a talk around what your students are actually worried about.

Are you licensed to practise in BC? +

Yes. I'm a registered chiropractor in good standing in British Columbia and carry my own malpractice coverage. I'll send registration details and a certificate of insurance to you or your administrator on request.

Do you work with new graduates? +

Yes, and deliberately. A new graduate has a degree, a licence, a loan and usually no plan, which is exactly where I was in 1993. Coaching a new grad looks different from coaching an established owner: less about fixing what's leaking, more about deciding what you're building before you commit money to it.

Tell me what's actually going on.

Stretched, stuck, needing coverage, or wanting a second set of eyes on your practice.

Book a Strategy Session

Or call 778-215-9310  ·  [email protected]

About Dr. Cary Yurkiw

A working chiropractor who covers practices the way I'd want mine covered.

For over 30 years I've been in practice β€” as an associate, as a clinic owner for more than 25 of them, and as a locum stepping into other doctors' practices. I've performed more than 100,000 adjustments, a great deal of that in busy, high-volume clinics where the book is full and the day doesn't let up.

Owning a practice is what taught me what actually matters when you hand it to someone else. It isn't technique. It's whether the notes are finished, whether the care plans hold, whether your staff had a good week, and whether the schedule is still full when you walk back in. That's the standard I cover to.

What owners get:

  • 30+ years of clinical experience, much of it at high volume
  • 100,000+ patient adjustments
  • Coverage in Kelowna, the Central Okanagan, and Vancouver's Westside
  • Comfortable across a range of practice management software
  • A clinic owner's read on what you're actually worried about while you're away
  • Marathon runner β€” a full book on a Friday afternoon isn't a problem

β€” Dr. Cary Yurkiw