Healthcare in America is at a crossroads, and as costs continue to rise, millions of people particularly the uninsured and underinsured are finding new reasons for hope, thanks to leaders like Dr. Uma Sitaula, DNP, FNP-C. As the CEO of Namaste Telehealth, she has built a practice that offers affordable virtual care $40 visits, discounted laboratory testing, and imaging with a particular focus on those who need it most, proving that compassionate, accessible healthcare is possible. With more than 20 years of experience in healthcare and over a decade as a nurse practitioner, she brings deep clinical credibility to a mission born from witnessing patients go years without basic care because they could not afford it.
As a doctoral-prepared, board-certified provider, she beautifully balances leading a team of five with running both Namaste Telehealth and Sasa MedSpa & Weight Loss Center, all while raising three children. Her story is one of remarkable grit returning to class eleven days after giving birth and presenting her capstone from a hospital bed two hours after delivering her second son and today she stands as an inspiring leader who believes that excellence grounded in compassion, respect, and empathy can transform lives, showing the world that healthcare can be both innovative and deeply human.
From Adversity to Advocacy, Dr. Uma Sitaula’s Journey in Nursing and Healthcare
Dr. Uma Sitaula’s story reflects grit, sacrifice, and an unshakable sense of purpose, beginning when she arrived in the United States in December 2007 to further her education. After unforeseen family financial circumstances forced her to leave Colorado State University, she transferred to Red Rocks Community College, turning the detour into a launching pad. She maintained a 4.0 GPA and earned recognition for academic excellence, leadership, and community service, including the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship 2010, All-Colorado Academic Team recognition, and a personal honor from the Governor of Colorado. She also married that year, making it one of the most meaningful periods of her life.
She transferred to Regis University, graduating through the nursing honors program with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing in 2012 before becoming a registered nurse in post-acute care. In 2013, she received the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation Continuing Graduate Award and began her Master of Science in Nursing at the University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus. Her first son was born on January 15, 2014, and she returned to class 11 days postpartum. Near the end of her master’s program, she had her second son and delivered her final capstone presentation virtually from her hospital bed two hours after giving birth. She graduated top of her class with a near-perfect GPA and became a certified Family Nurse Practitioner in 2016.
That same year, she began practicing in post-acute care, witnessing uninsured patients go without basic care and avoid preventive services due to fear of medical bills. The experience inspired her vision for a low-cost, self-pay practice, though she first completed her Doctor of Nursing Practice, graduating in 2022 with a near-perfect GPA and Graduate Leadership Award. In July 2024, she founded Namaste Telehealth to provide affordable healthcare, including preventive screenings, patient evaluations, blood work, imaging, and acute sick visits, with a focus on uninsured and underinsured patients.
A Vision Born from Witnessing the Gap, The Inspiration Behind Namaste Telehealth
After roughly eight years managing patients with complex health issues in acute and sub-acute care settings as a nurse practitioner, Dr. Uma Sitaula felt ready to apply her education, knowledge, and experience meaningfully. Her personal and professional experiences revealed how difficult the American healthcare system can be for uninsured and underinsured people, with some going years without recommended screenings or basic blood work because they could not afford primary care. Determined to address this gap and provide more equitable access, she created Namaste Telehealth, making healthcare more affordable, particularly primary care and preventive screening services.
As Namaste Telehealth has grown, that vision has remained consistent: to make healthcare more accessible and affordable for people who might otherwise delay or avoid care because of cost. She is proud that Namaste Telehealth provides another way for patients to access care when financial barriers might otherwise prevent them from seeking it.
How Clinical Experience Shapes Leadership and Decision-Making
More than 20 years in healthcare, including over 10 years as a nurse practitioner, have profoundly shaped Dr. Uma Sitaula’s approach to leadership, patient care, and healthcare decision-making as a Doctor of Nursing Practice. From a leadership perspective, she has learned that building a team around a shared vision is essential, and that true leadership often requires making difficult decisions, managing uncertainty, learning from failure, and continuing to lead even when there is no easy answer. Creating a healthy work environment matters just as much, because positive encouragement, clear expectations, and constructive feedback bring out the best in a team and create a more productive workplace.
In patient care and clinical decision-making, Dr. Uma Sitaula considers the entire clinical picture rather than treating laboratory or imaging results in isolation, providing holistic, individualized care. When abnormal results do not match symptoms or clinical presentation, she pauses to assess whether they accurately reflect the patient’s condition, especially when expected symptoms are absent. She believes providers must treat the patient, not the laboratory result alone, while never ignoring abnormal findings. Results should be interpreted alongside symptoms, clinical history, repeat testing when appropriate, and trends over time. Her approach balances trusting the numbers with trusting the patient in front of her.
When Care Collides with Cost, The Hardest Challenges in Telehealth
One of the biggest challenges in telehealth arises when a patient has abnormal results and needs to be referred to a specialist or sent to the emergency room but may not be able to afford that next level of care. More than 90% of the patients Dr. Uma Sitaula sees through telehealth are self-pay patients who are either uninsured or underinsured, and while Namaste Telehealth offers discounted laboratory testing and imaging along with low-cost primary care and screening services, finding specialists who accept self-pay patients can also be very difficult, and there are times when both the patient and the provider can feel helpless.
For example, Dr. Sitaula once treated an uninsured patient whose screening blood work showed significantly elevated liver enzymes, along with abdominal pain and clinical signs suggesting an inflamed gallbladder or developing gallstones. She recommended an emergency room evaluation, but the patient declined due to cost and requested an abdominal ultrasound instead. Based on her clinical judgment, Dr. Sitaula declined the non-urgent ultrasound because waiting could be dangerous and urged emergent evaluation. The patient ultimately required gallbladder removal surgery, reinforcing the importance of timely clinical assessment and acting on the overall patient presentation.
Situations like this are particularly challenging when working independently with underserved populations, and they highlight how difficult it can be when a patient needs a higher level of care but faces financial barriers to receiving it.
Affordable Care, Anytime, What Sets Namaste Telehealth Apart
Every telehealth visit with Dr. Uma Sitaula begins with the presenting problem and one question: “How can I help this patient within the scope of my practice and with the resources I have?” She takes a relevant history, assesses physical function, performs a virtual examination, orders laboratory testing or imaging when indicated, prescribes medications, and makes referrals when necessary. Available from 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., seven days a week, visits cost $40, with discounted testing and imaging, including X-rays from $40 and MRI studies under $300. Patients receive care from a doctoral-prepared, board-certified nurse practitioner with 10+ years of experience, regardless of economic or social status.
Whether bridging a medication gap for a patient with hypertension, managing diabetes care for someone without a primary care provider whether because they are visiting Colorado or do not have insurance or ordering lower-cost imaging when appropriate to rule out a fracture for an uninsured patient injured in a fall, this model offers a convenient and affordable way for patients to connect with a provider when they need care, which she believes is what sets Namaste Telehealth apart from more conventional approaches, particularly for people who are uninsured or underinsured.
Before and After, A Life Transformed by Leadership
| Before Her Leadership Journey | After Stepping Into Leadership |
| Stable, predictable, structured, financially secure | More responsibility, longer hours, greater accountability and pressure |
| Five-day workweek with occasional on-call duties | More freedom, flexibility, and control over her schedule |
| Clear roles, comfortable lifestyle, less pressure | A stronger sense of purpose and greater personal and professional growth |
| But she was not fulfilled, wanting something meaningful, searching for greater purpose | Leading a team of five, balancing Namaste Telehealth and Sasa MedSpa, leading with empathy, living life on her own terms, and finding greater fulfillment |
Building Trust Behind the Screen, Privacy, Safety, and Ethical Virtual Care
Patient trust is especially important when care is delivered virtually, and Dr. Uma Sitaula addresses it through deliberate, layered safeguards. The telehealth platform she uses is HIPAA-compliant and places a strong emphasis on protecting patient information, and she conducts virtual visits from a designated private room to help maintain patient confidentiality.
Patients receive the practice policies and consent forms before their appointment and are required to complete them prior to the visit, and during the visit, patients must verify their identity by showing an ID, which matches with the patient’s chart and visually confirms that she is speaking with the correct patient. She also introduces herself and clearly states her professional credentials, and while these steps help establish trust, clinical judgment remains central to providing ethical care and supporting informed decision-making, an approach shaped by more than 10 years of experience managing patients with complex medical conditions.
“You Saved My Life”, A Story of Impact When It Mattered Most
One patient story Dr. Uma Sitaula remembers involves a 72-year-old woman who sought telehealth care after losing private insurance while her Medicaid was pending and her new primary care appointment was a month away. She had run out of two COPD maintenance inhalers, relied on continuous supplemental oxygen, and could not obtain refills before seeing the new provider. During the emotional visit, she requested inhalers and an oxygen therapy prescription. Following a brief telehealth evaluation, Dr. Sitaula prescribed enough inhalers to last until the appointment, which the patient picked up within an hour, and coordinated with the oxygen company for her concentrator and necessary supplies.
About a month later, Dr. Sitaula received a personal letter from her thanking her for her care, in which she wrote that Namaste Telehealth had made it easy to see a qualified provider and had “saved my life.” A few months later, the patient contacted her again to let her know she had established care with both a primary care provider and a pulmonologist. Dr. Sitaula will always remember this patient and the impact Namaste Telehealth was able to have during a time when she was caught between insurance coverage and establishing care with new providers.
Staying Sharp, Staying Connected, Learning and Collaboration in Independent Practice
A strong network and a commitment to lifelong learning are what keep Dr. Uma Sitaula’s independent practice at Namaste Telehealth running at its best. She has built a network of healthcare professionals, including cardiologists, oncologists, and nephrologists, whom she can reach out to for informal professional input when needed for self-pay patients, and she has also maintained relationships with colleagues, physicians, pharmacies, laboratories, and imaging centers that help support care for self-pay patients, including access to discounted medications, laboratory testing, and imaging.
She regularly participates in continuing education courses and training and reviews medical journals and clinical guidelines to strengthen her knowledge and stay current with recommendations related to patient care, and these efforts have helped strengthen her clinical knowledge, professional relationships, and the quality of care she provides.
Dr. Uma Sitaula’s Take on Emerging Healthcare Technology
While Dr. Uma Sitaula’s telehealth platform offers some AI-enabled services, she has not incorporated them into her practice yet. She believes these emerging technologies show promise, but she remains cautious about determining how much they truly improve patient care. Before implementing them, she would like to hear more real-world feedback from patients and healthcare colleagues and better understand how these tools affect the quality of care. For her, new technology should be adopted thoughtfully and only when there is a clear benefit to the patient and provider.
The Growth That Comes from Leaving Comfort Behind
One of Dr. Uma Sitaula’s biggest moments of professional growth came when she left her stable, long-term provider role at a private practice to begin her entrepreneurial journey. Stepping outside her comfort zone was challenging, as she had the idea and vision but not all the answers, leaving her uncertain about success. Over time, she learned that it is okay to learn along the way and to use available tools, resources, and people to find solutions. Most importantly, she realized that success is not only about individual achievement, but also about the impact she makes in people’s lives and the legacy she is building.
The principles that continue to guide the way she cares for her patients are compassion, respect, professional integrity, and empathy, and treating patients holistically and truly listening to them helps build trust, because she believes every patient deserves to be treated with respect. She strives to provide evidence-based, patient-centered care and create an individualized plan for each patient, an approach shaped by years of education, clinical experience, and a continued commitment to lifelong learning.
A Day in a Leader’s Life, Dr. Uma Sitaula Daily Routine
- 6:45 a.m. — Early Morning: Wakes up, freshens up, makes breakfast for her three children (ages 7, 10, and 12); busy mornings.
- Around 7:30 a.m. — School Drop-Off & Fitness: She and her husband get the kids ready and drop them at school, after which she works out for an hour, has breakfast, and prepares for the day.
- 9:00–11:00 a.m. — Namaste Telehealth: Begins her workday from home with telehealth appointments.
- 11:00 a.m.–6:00 p.m. — Sasa MedSpa & Namaste Telehealth: Spends the rest of the workday at Sasa MedSpa, balancing in-person visits with scheduled telehealth appointments and coordinating her calendar to avoid double bookings.
- Around 2:00–3:00 p.m. — Midday Break: She and her team take a short break during this slower part of the day.
- 6:00–9:00 p.m. — Evening & Telehealth: After Sasa MedSpa closes, she returns home; Namaste Telehealth stays open until 9:00 p.m., so she sees patients from her designated private telehealth space when appointments are scheduled.
- Around 6:30 p.m. — Dinner & Family Time: Dinner around 6:30 p.m.; her husband’s support at home and in business has made extended telehealth hours possible.
- 8:00–10:00 p.m. — Wind-Down: Kids go to bed around 8:00 p.m.; she and her husband watch TV before bed around 10:00 p.m.
- Sunday: Sasa MedSpa is closed; usually only one or two telehealth appointments, giving her more time with family and to catch up on household chores.
An Open Letter from Dr. Uma Sitaula, DNP, FNP-C
To aspiring nurses, healthcare professionals, future leaders, and patients:
Lead with kindness. Be present with your patients, listen to them, and make sure they feel heard. That is how trust is built. Excellence grounded in compassion and trust can leave a lasting impact.
Use technology and innovative approaches to make it easier to serve people, but never lose sight of the importance of human connection.
And to patients: you deserve a healthcare experience where you feel heard, safe, and respected.
Do not ignore symptoms or changes that feel outside of what is normal for you. Advocate for yourself, ask questions, and share your concerns.
With gratitude and purpose,
Dr. Uma Sitaula, DNP, FNP-C
CEO, Namaste Telehealth
Key Takeaways from Dr. Uma Sitaula’s Life as a Leader
- Start early, stay present. Dr. Uma Sitaula’s day begins at 6:45 a.m. with family breakfast before anything else.
- Health fuels leadership. An hour at the fitness center after school drop-off keeps her energized for the day ahead.
- Structure beats chaos. Coordinating her calendar to avoid double bookings keeps two businesses running smoothly.
- Build a support system: Her husband’s role at home makes her extended telehealth hours possible.
- Balance is intentional, not accidental. She protects family dinners, wind-down time, and Sundays with her children.
- Purpose drives the pace. From 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., seven days a week, she keeps showing up for her patients and her family.
