How to Open a Nurse-Owned Practice in Maine

You've done the math in your head more than once. A few injectable appointments on your day off, on your own schedule, in your own space, and suddenly the shifts you pick up out of obligation start to look optional. Maine is made for a mobile or concierge practice: smaller towns, loyal clients, and a lot of people who'd rather see a nurse they trust than drive two hours to a city med spa. (Already run your own practice? Skip ahead, there's a section below built specifically for you.)

The thing that stops most nurses in Maine was never the clinical work. You already do harder things on a Tuesday than a first tox or IV appointment will ever ask of you. What stops people is everything around it, the ownership rules, the medical director, the setup, all sitting there as one giant undefined to-do. So let's take it in order, starting with the question every Maine nurse asks first.

Can a nurse own an aesthetics, wellness, or functional health practice in Maine?

Yes, with one structural difference from most states. Maine requires a professional LLC rather than a standard LLC, because Maine defines registered nursing, advanced practice nursing, and medicine as professional services. (31 MRSA §1560; 13 MRSA §723(7)(A) and §731(1).)

That carries a real constraint. Ownership of a professional LLC is limited to individuals licensed to render the professional service. A nurse can own it. A non-licensed co-owner cannot, and that includes a spouse or a business partner who isn't licensed. Maine's narrow exceptions permitting nonlicensed ownership apply to public accountancy and dentistry, not to nursing or medicine. If you were planning to bring somebody in on the business side, plan around this early.

Maine has no cosmetic-procedure rule at all

This one runs the other way from most states, and it makes Maine simpler. There's no rule specific to nonsurgical cosmetic procedures, which means there's no split between cosmetic and non-cosmetic services in the delegation analysis. You're not checking whether a neurotoxin falls under a different regime than an IV. The governing authority is the prescriber's scope, full stop.

Neither an MD, DO, nor APRN medical director has to be physically present on the premises. Maine's physician delegation statute doesn't require it.

The asymmetry here is liability, not presence

Where other states differentiate credentials by where somebody has to stand, Maine differentiates by who carries the exposure. Maine's physician delegation statute makes the delegating physician legally liable for the delegated activities and treats the person performing them as the physician's agent. That codified liability-and-agency standard applies specifically to MD and DO delegation. (32 MRSA §3270-A; §2594-A.)

One thing to check before you sign anything: if your medical director is an APRN, ask about their hours. Maine requires a certified nurse practitioner to practice at least 24 months under supervision before obtaining independent status, and an APRN still inside that window generally can't serve as another practice's medical director.

A small Maine detail that comes up more than you'd think: the state caps what you can charge for medical records. Paper copies max out at $5 for the first page and 45 cents per additional page up to $250, electronic at $150, and retrieval, technology, system-maintenance, and data-storage charges are prohibited outright. There's a daily civil forfeiture for failing to release a record after a reasonable time.

How Five Square actually gets you started

The whole thing lives in one place: the free Five Square Nurses app. Your medical oversight, the step-by-step training, your pharmacy and vendor accounts, and the entire community of nurse business owners are all in there. You can open it between patients, on a lunch break, or on the couch at 9pm, and pick up right where you left off.

When you join, you're not handed a login and wished good luck. There's a Getting Started path that puts the order of operations right in front of you, so the mountain becomes a checklist.

You pick your lane, or combine them. Five Square supports three:

• Aesthetics. Tox and dermal filler, the core of a nurse-injector practice, with room to add more as you train.
• Wellness. IV therapy and vitamin injections. Low startup, very mobile-friendly, and a natural add-on to aesthetics.
• Functional Health. Peptides, lab work, and whole-person care for nurses who want longer-term, relationship-based patients.

You bring the nursing license and the nerve. We bring the medical director, the compliant Maine setup, the training, member pricing on products, marketing help, and weekly live calls with experts and other nurse owners, so you're never stuck guessing alone.

And every Five Square member, brand new or already established, gets instant on-demand Good Faith Exams for $19.99 each, a price we subsidize because we believe in nurse success. A walk-in can be cleared in about a minute, seven days a week, and the exam paperwork lands right in the patient's chart, which is exactly what a state board wants to see.

You start before you feel ready, and that's the point

Most programs make you wait. Watch every module, sit through every call, and someday you finally see a patient. By then half the people who started have lost momentum. Five Square runs the other way: you start your practice while you're still finishing the training, because the training sticks when there's a real patient on next week's calendar.

Kayla, an ER nurse in North Carolina, had never injected anyone when she joined. She watched the videos, took notes, and set a goal of 30 people in 30 days. Here's the advice she'd give a nurse who's scared to start:

"Believe in yourself, even when you don't know how to do something. Figure it out. The clinical knowledge from your nursing career is more than enough to get started, and there's a community of people around you who want to help. Do it scared."
- Kayla, ER nurse

She launched April 4. Her first month: 46 appointments, 28 good-faith exams, and $10,320 in revenue, run out of a single room inside a salon she'd been a client at for years. That's one real month from one real nurse, not a typical result and not a promise, and your market and hours are your own. The point is she was exactly where you are, never-done-this-before, and she started anyway.

Does it actually work once you launch?

Getting launched is step one. What you really want to know is whether it works after that. Here's the honest picture, numbers included, because income claims in this industry deserve a skeptical read.

Results vary, and they depend on things no membership controls: your market, your hours, how long you've been at it, how consistently you market. As practices mature, some established members report months in the $10,000 to $20,000 range. Individual results vary widely. Some land higher, some lower, and nobody here will promise you a number.

What's more useful is the math underneath, which is public. Neurotoxin appointments bring in $200 to $600. A syringe of filler runs $500 to $800. IV sessions run $150 to $350. Functional health consults run $150 to $300, often with patients coming back monthly. At those prices, two to four appointments a month would cover the $899 membership before product costs, and everything past that is the business growing. Want to see it with your own pricing? Run your numbers in the Five Square membership earnings calculator.

The nurses say it better than a revenue range does:

"I'm never going back to floor nursing. I didn't think making this income while still making it to all my kids' activities was even possible. Five Square made it easy."
- Lindsey K., RN

"Having my own schedule, that flexibility as a mom to say the kids are at school these hours, so I can see patients and make way more than I was making at the hospital."
- Ashley C., RN

Inside the community, the wins show up in real time. A nurse a few weeks into her launch posted she was already up to eight bookings, nearly all of it from one post in a local mom's Facebook group. Another saw a husband and wife for their good-faith exams in under ten minutes using the same-day exam tool when her director wasn't free. Scroll the forum any week and it's full of small wins like these.

The Google rating sits at 4.8 stars, and the reviews keep naming the same things: the setup help, the medical director, the training, and a team that answers when you're stuck.

Already run a practice in Maine? There's a membership for that too

Not every nurse reading this is starting from scratch. Plenty of you already run your own practice and already pay for a medical director somewhere. If that's you, a lot of what's above is stuff you sorted out a while ago, and Five Square has a leaner membership built for exactly your spot. In Maine, it's actually how we're opening first.

It's called the Established Nurse Membership. It's $799 a month, month to month, no annual lock. You get a medical director who's actually engaged, a compliant structure in Maine, vendor and product pricing, the Five Square Nurse Community, and those instant on-demand Good Faith Exams at $19.99 each, a price we subsidize for our members because we believe in nurse success. There's no new-injector training folded in, because you don't need it and shouldn't pay for it. If you ever want the full education stack later, you can add it.

Here's the honest pitch. Most established practices are either paying $1,500 to $5,000 a month for a director who's genuinely involved, or a few hundred for one who signs protocols and disappears, which is its own risk when a board comes asking. For most nurses, $799 all in beats both, on price and on what you actually get. Tell us what you're paying now and we'll show you the side by side. No pitch, just the math.

What it costs, and the catch nurses look for

For a nurse starting out, membership is a flat $899 a month for one tier, $1,199 for two, $1,499 for all three, on a 12-month term. Startup beyond that is lighter than people expect: a starter tox order, insurance that runs well under most nurses' guesses, and the products you actually use. No revenue share, ever. (Already have a practice? The Established Nurse Membership above is $799 a month, month to month.)

That's usually the moment the skeptical part of your brain asks where the catch is. Fair. So, plainly: you own your practice and your patients through your own LLC. Five Square does not take a cut of what you make, and if a discovery call turns up that the honest answer for you is 'not yet' or 'start smaller,' the team will tell you that too.

Maine-specific costs to budget for

Two things Maine caps or requires that other states don't. Medical records copy fees are capped by statute at $5 for the first page and 45 cents per additional page up to $250 for paper, or $150 for electronic, and retrieval, technology, system-maintenance, and data-storage charges are prohibited outright. There's a daily civil forfeiture for not releasing a record after a reasonable time. Separately, biomedical waste generator registration with Maine DEP is required at any generation volume, not just above a threshold, and it's filed per location.

So, where do you actually start in Maine?

You book the call. That's genuinely it. Not a six-month research project, a 15-minute conversation about your license, your goals, and what launching (or leveling up) in Maine would look like for you. Whether you're brand new or already running a practice, the whole reason Five Square exists is so you're not doing the hard parts alone.

Schedule a discovery call

Common questions about starting a practice in Maine

Do I need a PLLC in Maine, or will a regular LLC work?

Maine requires a professional LLC. It defines nursing and medicine as professional services, and professional services have to be rendered through a professional entity. Ownership is limited to licensed individuals, so a non-licensed spouse or partner can't hold an interest.

Does Maine treat neurotoxins differently from IV therapy?

No, and that's unusual. Maine has no rule specific to nonsurgical cosmetic procedures, so there's no cosmetic versus non-cosmetic delegation split. The prescriber's scope governs both.

Can a registered nurse own a med spa in Maine? Yes. Maine lets a registered nurse own your practice directly, with a nurse practitioner as the remote medical director. It's one of the more straightforward states for it.

Do I need a medical director for aesthetics in Maine? Yes. Maine requires oversight for medical aesthetic services, and every Five Square practice includes a medical director as part of the membership.

Can a nurse do Botox in Maine? Yes, within a compliant setup and with the oversight Maine requires. The clinical work is rarely the question; it's whether the practice around it is built legally.

I already run a practice in Maine. Can Five Square still help? Yes. The Established Nurse Membership is built for nurses who already have a practice: $799 a month, month to month, with a medical director, a compliant structure, vendor pricing, and $19.99 on-demand Good Faith Exams. No new-injector training you don't need, and no annual lock.

How much are Good Faith Exams? For Five Square members, simple Good Faith Exams are $19.99 each, on demand, seven days a week, a price we subsidize because we believe in nurse success. One exam can clear a patient for several treatments at once, and the documentation attaches right to the patient's chart.

Is Five Square available in Maine yet? Five Square is expanding into Maine, and in many new states the Established Nurse Membership opens first. The fastest way to get the timeline and hold your spot is a discovery call.

How much does it cost to start? For a new nurse, membership is $899 a month for one tier, and startup beyond that (a tox order, insurance, products) is lighter than most nurses expect. If you already run a practice, the Established Nurse Membership is $799 a month, month to month. No revenue share either way.