Spotlight Series

Guest Name: Stacie Egan

Credentials: DNP, FNP-C

Stacie Egan: Sounds great.

Dr. Betty DeLass: Awesome. Okay. Um, Stacie was born, reared, and educated in the Ogden area. Stacie Egan received her bachelor’s of science and nursing from Weber State University where she graduated summa cum laude. Afterward, she obtained her Master of Nursing from the University of Cincinnati. Most recently, she finished off her education with her doctor of nursing practice from Weber State University in 2022. Woohoo! Amazing there. Um, Miss Stacie’s decision to become a family nurse practitioner stems from her love of working closely with patients and seeing the positive difference she can make in their lives. She chose to work in gastroenterology because she’s very passionate about health pro promotion and disease pro disease prevention. Um the gut has been called the body’s second brain and gastroenterology health is important to overall well-being. Stacie’s goal as a healthcare provider is to use her clinical skills and knowledge to help Utahns improve their health and quality of life. Stacie’s been married to her sweetheart for 29 years. Congratulations. That’s a long time. And has four beautiful children. In her free time, she and her family enjoy Utah’s recreational offerings like skiing at Snowbasin, going to the Ogden Twilight concerts, paddle boarding, and going on trail runs with her two German Shepherds. Amazing. Wonderful. Love that bio.

Stacie Egan: Thank you.

Dr. Betty DeLass: Awesome. Well, thank you again, Stacie, for being on. Um I’m excited for to to go over all these questions and get to know you more and for our audience to know who you are and what you do and know that you’re a resource out there for our patients and and the like. So, first off, what like I know we got a little piece of that glimpse in the bio, but what made you decide to be a family nurse practitioner?

Stacie Egan: It was actually when I was having my babies, I used a certified nurse midwife to u manage my pregnancies and I just loved her approach to medicine or her approach to me. Um, instead of treating me like a number, I felt like she really cared about me and my health. And so it was it kind of uh just spoke to something in me. And then I think I chose gastroenterology just because it’s so interesting. Um all of the new information we have about the gut brain access and all of the things that GI encompasses like the liver and pancreas and the stomach and small bowel large bell. I mean, it’s a really an amazing field and so many people have GI issues and it’s nice for me to be in a place where I can care about people like my nurse midwife cared about me.

Dr. Betty DeLass: Amazing. Yeah. Having that connection, that special touch and like giving the care that you want to give is just it’s it’s amazing. I I same thing here. So, okay. What do you feel like in your world of gastroenterology, what makes you different in the way that you provide care the and all of those things like that? Like give us some specifics on that.

Stacie Egan: Okay. Um I think if you talk to one of my patients, they would say uh they like me because I listen to them. I feel like a lot of patients, especially women and people of color, get pretty neglected in the health care system. they get ignored when they talk about their symptoms and um they’ll they’ll be told something like, “Well, your GI issues are because you have have anxiety or it’s hormonal.” And patients know there’s something wrong with them, but they can’t get someone to take them seriously. And I want to be that person. I can’t even tell you how many people have said, “You’re the first person who’s ever listened to me. You’re the first person who’s ever done an exam on which sounds crazy, but I I feel like there’s a problem of um women and like I said, people of color just getting ignored in our health care system and and it’s not right. And I want to be someone who listens and helps um my patients figure out what’s going on. My philosophy is if you listen to a patient, they’ll tell you what’s wrong with them. And they might not know the diagnosis, but all you have to listen to is their symptoms and take the time to actually care about them and and we can make a difference.

Dr. Betty DeLass: 100% agree with all of that. Yes. Okay. Who is who would you say would be an ideal fit for you? Like what kinds of conditions are coming in? What types of patients are coming in? Who’s something that’s like if they were watching this, they’d be like, “Oh my gosh, that’s me. I need to go see you.” Like what type of patient is your ideal patient?

Stacie Egan: Um I actually enjoy treating a lot of different GI issues. I love to treat um inflammatory bowel disease. There’s so many great new biologic therapies that are safer and work better. There’s a brand new drug for um metabolic associated statpatitis. So fatty liver with fibrosis and it actually can reverse liver fibrosis. It’s so exciting because as long as I’ve been in GI, the only thing that I can tell patients until now is um diet, exercise, stop drinking alcohol, and now we have something that we can actually be proactive with. And then I’m I’m really good at treating SIBO. I’m really good at working through that. and SIBO has such a negative um effect on a patient’s whole quality of life. Um your gut is your immune system. It’s your neurotransmitter. So, it affects your anxiety, depression. Um it’s just amazing when you can get um people diagnosed with something and then help them treat. Um, you know, I do general GI, so we do a lot of things, but those are probably my three favorite things to treat. IBD, liver, and uh SIBO.

Dr. Betty DeLass: Amazing. Amazing. So good to have a resource like you that one is is caring and and just encompasses that good quality care and then also really good at what at treating those unique conditions. So thank you for being in our community for that. Um okay, walk us through the process to work with you. Like do we just walk in? Do we need a referral? Do we call? Like what how does that look like from start to finish to get an appointment?

Stacie Egan: It it depends on your insurance plan. Some insurance plans will just lay let you make an appointment with me. You can’t just walk in. you have to make an appointment. Um, other insurance companies need a referral like Tricare TriWest. So, those patients would go to their primary care provider um with an appropriate condition and then they could be referred and we would call them to get them on our schedule.

Dr. Betty DeLass: Okay, great. Easy, easy. Okay. Um, one of my favorite questions to ask is what’s something that most people don’t know that you think that they should know about you, your services, the care that you provide?

Stacie Egan: I believe that your overall quality of life cannot be good if your gut’s not good. It has so much to do with everything you do. And SIBO is a good example. Um, people with SIBO have pretty consistent abdominal pain, bloating. They may come to me and say, “I feel like my depression medication isn’t working anymore. It makes sense to me because your serotonin is made in your gut.” So, um, even if you’ve been diagnosed with something before, it may not be the right diagnosis, especially if you’re treating something and your symptoms aren’t getting better, that’s the time when you should come into GI and we can start from scratch and figure out what’s wrong with you. Because I have a lot of people who’ve been diagnosed with IBS or irritable bowel syndrome who’ve never had a true workup. You need a true workup to have that diagnosis. So you might be missing something and we can probably make a difference in your quality of life if we can diagnose you with something and actually treat it effectively.

Dr. Betty DeLass: Totally. Totally. Absolutely. Okay. Um is there anything special you want to promote? Any events going on? Any health wisdom nuggets or anything like that?

Stacie Egan: I think one of the biggest um things that I like to promote right now is um diet. I feel like patients don’t understand what a good diet means. You’ll talk to them about, you know, carbohydrates, proteins, fats, and what they should be eating, and they they are confused. But I believe that diet is the cornerstone of health. So, I like to utilize my dietitian colleagues to help my patients figure out diet so that they can use natural things like eating eating properly and and they can feel better. And this helps every single condition. If you’re eating well, everything’s better. Not that it treats everything, but if you can figure out a healthy diet, I always recommend Mediterranean, but if you can figure out a healthy diet, it’s going to make a difference. And then I know that a lot of your group does pelvic floor health. And I actually promote a ton of pelvic floor health because if you have a problem with your pelvic floor, it will make everything worse from SIBO because that’s a problem where things might be not not be moving like they should. um incontinence, um I IBD, if you if you can have a normal bowel movement because of your pelvic floor, it makes everything worse. I use a lot of pelvic floor therapy actually. Um I feel like I refer a lot and I I wish that um more OB/GYN would think of it because there’s so many women especially in Utah where we have relatively high birth rates who’ve had multiple kids, never had any sort of help in between pregnancy. So, um, in our clinic, we do something called anorectal manometry, which can help figure out what exactly is going on. And then I always refer to my pelvic floor colleagues because it makes such a difference when we’re trying to treat things like SIBO, like inflammatory bowel disease.

Dr. Betty DeLass: Absolutely. It makes such a difference and and people don’t know about it.

Stacie Egan: I know.

Dr. Betty DeLass: I know. And we’re just so thankful to have you, especially up by our Layton Clinic, to know that we can know, like, and trust, and refer, and collaborate and do all the wonderful things like that. So, thank you for

Stacie Egan: Yeah. No, I I love it. Team team medicine is the way to go because no one can do everything and when we work together, patient outcomes are so much better.

Dr. Betty DeLass: Totally. Totally. I always say patients always win when we work together. They always win.

Stacie Egan: Absolutely. There’s no other way.

Dr. Betty DeLass: Yeah. That’s great. Awesome. Okay, my favorite question to ask everyone is, what do you want to be known for?

Stacie Egan: I want to be known for um caring, for making people feel listened to, and I want to be kind. I think there’s not enough kindness in the world right now.

Dr. Betty DeLass: Yes. So great. So great. Okay, let us know all for all of our listeners where they can find you, how do they get in contact, your location, website, phone number, all the things.

Stacie Egan: So I’m at the Ogden Clinic um GI GI in Layton. So it’s the Layton Specialty Center. I’m looking at my address because I never I never look at it. Um 1916 North 700 West Suite 250 Layton, Utah. And you can make an appointment with my clinic at 8014753380. So I would love to help anyone who’s interested and thank you so much for having me today.

Dr. Betty DeLass: Thank you so much for being on our spotlight series. Thank you for all you’re doing in the community and for your love and caring that you provide patients and the collaboration that you do with us specifically at Reborn Pelvic Health & Wellness. So, thank you so much.

Stacie Egan: Yeah. Thank you.