Meet the Team: Khanh Nguyen, FNP-C, MSN

Speaker 1 (00:07): You're listening to the La Jolla Cosmetic Podcast.

Monique (00:14): Welcome, everyone. I'm Monique, your hostess, and this is the La Jolla Cosmetic Podcast. If you're listening to this episode, I'm guessing it's because you want to get to know today's guest a little bit better, perhaps you're considering a consultation, or maybe you've already had an appointment. You're just curious, whatever your reason we're here to help you.

Monique (00:34): So today we're talking with Khanh Nguyen and getting to know him a little bit better. So Khanh tell us about yourself and cause we're going to talk about your training and your credentials. That's certainly super important. And we want to ask you about that, but, we'll get to that in a minute. First, I want to ask, you know, what do your patients usually say about you?

Khanh Nguyen (00:55): I think you said this I'm a little tough cookie to crack. However, for me, it's always important that I put patients first. So I think that's why I do less talking and more listening when it comes to them. So they really appreciate that. The other piece is having a male provider is always a different aspect for them as well. Because they're like, well, 80 to 90% of our clients are female. Like what is this guy going to know about me as a female?

Monique (01:19): Oh.

Khanh Nguyen (01:19): But I have a huge history in art, photography. I did a lot of fashion PR and things like that. And I'd have a very artistic side to me. So the combination of medicine and art really combines into what we do now. So I think they see through that as well.

Monique (01:34): And so tell me about your background. Like how did you get into this field?

Khanh Nguyen (01:39): Yeah, I spent most of my professional life in medicine a large proportion of that in hospital management. So between primary care, family practice and hospital management, that was most of my years and I felt unfulfilled at work one day. So I was looking for jobs and something popped up and it said, fillers, Botox, aesthetics. I'm like, what is this world? So, and of course you need experience. So I jumped head first into it. I went and took a course, took a medical conference. And at that medical conference, everyone's like, have you done this before? I'm like, no, never done this in my life. So I found out that one, I was pretty good at it. I'm decent, hopefully. And the other piece is I was very passionate towards it because it really let me combine that artistic side of me with medical side of me. And that's how I got into it and never left.

Monique (02:26): I love that. So how long have you been doing this?

Khanh Nguyen (02:30): Oh man. I've lost track. Let's say four, four and a half years Monique. I believe.

Monique (02:34): So, that's hundreds and hundreds of patients.

Khanh Nguyen (02:37): Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

Monique (02:39): And what is your favorite thing to do? When you're in, if you've got a willing patient who says what's your favorite thing? Do that.

Khanh Nguyen (02:47): I like it all. I like the variety of it. Give me lasers one moment, Botox the next moment, sculpting the next moment. But probably what I'm most known for is probably PDO threads of just being at La Jolla, we do a ton of PDO threads. When I brought down to San Diego, it was really a, a steep hill decline in regards to education and showing it to clients. But I think through that foundation and how I built it up, I think PDO threads is what I enjoy the most and probably what I'm most known for.

Monique (03:12): Yeah. And he's being very humble because he was voted the number one thread provider in the county. Is that right? Or in Southern California?

Khanh Nguyen (03:23): Yeah. In San Diego, number one for Nova threads and then Orange County, number three.

Monique (03:27): Number three, and in our office won number one. Yeah. Or I should say one W O N number one. And that's mostly because of Khanh but our whole team loves threads, but you brought them to our office. So we weren't doing them prior to your coming to the office. And so it's one of our most popular procedures.

Khanh Nguyen (03:46): Yeah. It's and especially with YouTube, Instagram and everyone having notoriety about threads, it's really blown up in the past year or two.

Monique (03:54): And while we're on the topic, we do have a "QuaranTea with LJC" on our YouTube where we talk all about threads. And one of my really good friends actually came and saw you because she watched that episode and she talked about it for a year. And then she came this spring and she had her procedure and she looks amazing. Amazing, because we zoom every single week. So.

Khanh Nguyen (04:16): I hope she's happy with it.

Monique (04:17): Yeah.

Monique (04:18): She's so happy. She looks great. So when you're listening to your patients, you know, what have you learned and why is it important to listen closely to what they're saying?

Khanh Nguyen (04:28): It's really their wants. One of the things that distinguishes myself as a provider versus maybe other ones is when someone comes in and they say, "Tell me what I need". I automatically put it back in their court. I say my wants aren't necessarily what you want. Maybe I'll tell you, I want to put huge lips into you, but you were asking me about cool sculpting. You know? So, so for me, I really want to understand why you want to do, what you want to do. And then we'll discuss why it's occurring. Once we understand the whys, the what, the hows then you and I will formate a plan together. So it's really, you dictating your care, which I learned quite a bit about in, in health. Who knows you better than yourself?

Monique (05:10): That's true. And now where did you train? What's your undergraduate? Did you do undergraduate degree and where? Was that in hospital administration? Or

Khanh Nguyen (05:20): Long history, I'll try to make it short. I was, I was initially pre-med I didn't make it through pre-med so I've got a bachelor's in chemistry. Went to try to go to medical school again, I got weight listed. Didn't get into medical school. So I continued my education and someone mentioned nursing. So I got into nursing. Then I went to work, but then again, just always doing more, and more, and more... Finally got my family nurse practitioner. Jumped into aesthetics from a medical conference that was in LA. Through that, jumped into something else to teach myself lasers, threads. So I'm always doing more and learning more, always... Like LA Jolla, always on the cutting edge, finding new technologies, finding new treatments. Because again, it's all about the patients, but that's how I slowly progressed and got into this field.

Monique (06:04): Where did you grow up? Have you always been in San Diego or did you move here at some point?

Khanh Nguyen (06:09): No, I'm I'm first generation American. So I was born in Vietnam. I moved here when I was four. Most of my life is in California. I moved down to San Diego three years ago from Sacramento, Northern California. And then a brief stent in Manhattan as well, but mostly California.

Monique (06:26): What does a perfect workday look like for you?

Khanh Nguyen (06:30): Perfect workday. Hmm. Corny as it sounds, I'm probably one of the most like optimistic, positive people you can meet. So every day is a good work day for me, whether it's slammed with patients from eight to eight or we have a nice, slow chill day. Every single day is a happy day. I'm one of those people that don't say I have to go to work, but I get to go to work. So every day is a good day.

Monique (06:53): I love that. I love that. And what's the last thing you do at the end of your work day? Do you have like a little ritual at the end?

Khanh Nguyen (07:02): Not really. Probably when I get home, I work out right away. So that's the ending to, I'd probably say my work day. Just always finish it off with a nice little workout.

Monique (07:12): Thant's nice. And what do you like to do outside of the office?

Khanh Nguyen (07:16): Family, friends are always important to me. I'm always making myself available to the closest people around me. I love to travel. You asked me beforehand, you've been seeing me do a lot of traveling and most non COVID years. I'm probably out of the country more than in the country. And then lastly, I really discovered helping the community. So during COVID I really saw the other side of the Asian population. People always think that Asians are the well to do, well acclimated, but I saw the first generation elderly population really struggled during this time. Oh. So every two weeks, one of the groups I volunteer for and sponsor money towards we deliver or hand out six to 800 meals every two weeks to the elderly or the less fortunate in Orange County.

Monique (07:57): Oh wow. That's wonderful. And what is that organization called?

Khanh Nguyen (08:01): The main one is called Vit Care. So Vit for Vietnam, although it's expanded past the Vietnamese population in care. The subsidiary under that is called Operation Moving Forward. So what they do is one Asian population. However, we branched off of that, the elderly, the mental health population, and then just the less fortunate in general.

Monique (08:20): That's wonderful. And so what does that consist of? Do you actually deliver, go drive and deliver things? Or

Khanh Nguyen (08:27): Yeah, we set up at one of the restaurants who organize, helps organize it. So they open up their kitchen to us every two weeks on Sunday. So from there people prepare the meals and then volunteers will show up and either hand out the meals to people who can show up and pick up the of meals. Or what I like to do is I deliver the meals. So I'll pick up anywhere from 10 to 20 meals and deliver it for the next three hours to people who can't otherwise come and pick up meals.

Monique (08:51): Oh, that's wonderful. I love that. You know, La Jolla Cosmetic has a long history of giving back to the community and you know, I love hearing the stories of people within our team who also make that a priority in their life. I think it's really wonderful. Now, what are the things that you would want our listeners to know about you?

Khanh Nguyen (09:13): I can smile. I can laugh Monique, every once in a while. So professional me and outside me are very, very different. The people who have seen both sides of it, they're like, this is not the Khanh at work. So I do laugh. I do giggle, but I also treat this side of beauty very importantly. So I treat it with the respect of medicine. But at the end of the day, it is fun. I'm trying to get you to your goals. I do laugh. I do smile.

Monique (09:37): And in a romper, tell me about rompers because you have some really awesome clothing.

Khanh Nguyen (09:44): So there's, the...

Monique (09:45): Not that I've been spying on your Instagram or anything, but.

Khanh Nguyen (09:49): So there you go. There's the professional me and outside me. So it started with, I have this very outlandish cousin who, his wardrobe was very colorful. So we've been joking for years about the momper.

Monique (10:00): The, momper, a man romper.

Khanh Nguyen (10:01): The man romper. So for about a couple months it became like this fashion trend. And then we went to Hawaii in January, I believe. And he's like, okay, I'm bringing rompers. I'm like, go for it. He brought rompers for four of us, three of my cousins and one for myself. So we're walking around Hawaii with palm tree rompers, flamingo rompers, pineapple rompers, and people are just stopping us on the street. There's this photographer that stopped us. So now when I travel, especially to a tropical place, I'll bring a handful of rompers for either myself or my friends and,

Monique (10:35): They're probably really easy to pack, you know, it's fabulous little travel... travel item.

Khanh Nguyen (10:42): It's a shirt and pants all in one.

Monique (10:44): What's wrong with that, right? No, I thought that was just so cute. I saw those Hawaii pictures and then I saw lately you've been traveling. Where did you go most recently?

Khanh Nguyen (10:54): Yeah. I just got back from Cancun. However, the two weeks before that I came back from Greece and Croatia.

Monique (10:58): Mm-hmm

Monique (10:59): Yeah, I saw Greece. I couldn't remember what was before that, but it looks really, really fun. And I love that. I love that. That you sort of go in all in, you know, whether it's all in for your work or with it's all in for play that you're all in and embracing it completely, which is wonderful. So to learn more about Khanh you can go on our website and you can see before and after photos, you can see, there's videos on our YouTube channel, where you can kind of get to know him. Also, if you are listening and you show us that you have subscribed to our podcast, you just bring in your phone or to show that you're a subscriber, we're going to give you $25 off of $50 or more in our med spa. And so I want to ask you Khanh, if you had a free $25 gift certificate to spend on $50 or more, what one thing would you put that towards? Or what would you buy?

Khanh Nguyen (11:57): Sunscreen would probably be number one. Southern California, we don't wear enough of it and that's probably the one best thing you can do to anti-age. If it's $25, I just put it toward skincare. So either face wash, Skin Better is always my favorite, but sunscreen. So skincare it is.

Monique (12:12): That's a great answer. So again, head to our website, if you want more information, we have all the links in the show notes. It has how to contact us and where we can answer all your questions. You can text us, you can email us, you can call us. And we're happy to answer those for you. So Khanh, Thank you again for this time and we will see you all later.

Khanh Nguyen (12:38): All right. Thanks.

Speaker 1 (12:38): Take a screenshot of this podcast episode with your phone and show it at your consultation or appointment or mentioned the promo code "PODCAST" to receive $25 off any service or product of $50 or more at La Jolla Cosmetic. La Jolla Cosmetic is located just off the I-5 San Diego freeway in the Ximed Building on the Scripps Memorial Hospital Campus. To learn more, go to ljcsc.com or follow the team on Instagram @ljcsc. The La Jolla Cosmetic Podcast is a production of The Axis. THEAXIS.IO.