This episode is one we recorded a while back with Lizz Card and Joy Obayemi who are also third year medical students. In it, we discuss the work they did in Tanzania at the Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center, performing research with a focus on global surgery. First, we hear a little bit about each of their backgrounds, and then we jump into some of their projects, including looking into the repercussions medical bills have on mental health, and the role of traditional bone setters in the Tanzanian health system. We also discuss what it was like traveling to Africa, and about some of their unforgettable memories, including a close call with a hippo.

The Penn Global Surgery Group is hosting a conference on November 17th at the Perelman School of medicine for those interested.

The Penn Global Surgery Symposium

https://www.med.upenn.edu/pennglobalsurgerygroup/upcoming-events.html

Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Centre

https://www.kcmc.ac.tz/

Geoff Tabin

https://www.cureblindness.org/who-we-are/founders/geoff-tabin-md

Dr. Sheth and Global Ortho

http://www.globalortho.org/archives/our_team/neilsheth

Lizz's Art!

http://cargocollective.com/lizzcard?fbclid=IwAR0SB68-_6bDxogbog5-fiND_EqUxpmgCmOOvx9MLKwDvZSa0A1Ay7ftoqs

https://www.facebook.com/lizzcardartist/

Today’s episode is Part 2 of a conversation Logan and I had with Dr. Shivan Mehta, who is the Associate Chief Innovation Officer at Penn Medicine. A gastroenterologist by training, Dr. Mehta is also the Director of Operations at the Penn Center for Healthcare Innovation, and works with the Leonard Davis Institute Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics. He received his MD, MBA and Masters in Health Policy all from Penn. We had a great conversation with topics ranging from his background, The Center for Healthcare Innovation, and behavioral economics research and how it can be used to improve patient care.

In Part 2 we discuss more of his work and the role of behavioral economics in healthcare.

Links

Part 1

https://soundcloud.com/pennhealthxpodcast/34-dr-shivan-mehta-part-1-using-behavioral-economics-to-improve-healthcare

Dr. Mehta's Bio

healthcareinnovation.upenn.edu/bio/shiva…-mba-mshp

Today’s episode is Part 1 of a conversation Logan and I had with Dr. Shivan Mehta, who is the Associate Chief Innovation Officer at Penn Medicine. A gastroenterologist by training, Dr. Mehta is also the Director of Operations at the Penn Center for Healthcare Innovation, and works with the Leonard Davis Institute Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics. He received his MD, MBA and Masters in Health Policy all from Penn. We had a great conversation with topics ranging from his background, The Center for Healthcare Innovation, and behavioral economics research and how it can be used to improve patient care.

In Part 1, we learn more about Dr. Mehta and how he got where he is today, and in Part 2 we discuss more of his work and behavioral economics.

Links

Dr. Mehta's Bio

https://healthcareinnovation.upenn.edu/bio/shivan-mehta-md-mba-mshp

In this episode, I speak with Logan Brock, my occasional co-host, and Dr. Scott Trerotola who is the Chief of Interventional Radiology as well as Vice Chair for Quality and Safety at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.

Dr. Trerotola is a mentor to many medical students, and pursues research in hemodialysis and venous access among many other topics. Along with his surgical and academic work, Dr. Treretola is also an inventor, holding numerous patents for medical device – one of which, the Arrow-Trerotola Device, is still used across the country.

In the conversation, we hit on his time in medical at Penn, how he developed business acumen outside of the classroom, the field of interventional radiology, how to navigate the relationship with your research mentors and become a first author, and how medical device innovation can complement a career in academic medicine.

It’s an incredible conversation filled with actionable advice and fascinating stories, and we are thankful that Dr. Treretola continues to take new medical students under his wing each and every year.

Links

Dr. Trerotola’s Bio

https://www.med.upenn.edu/apps/faculty/index.php/g5165284/p15252

The Arrow-Trerotola Device

https://www.teleflex.com/emea/documentLibrary/documents/941111-000001_ArrowTrerotola_PTD_1311.pdf

Interventional Radiology

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interventional_radiology

The Evolution of Interventional Radiology

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3036249/

Dialysis Access

https://vascular.org/patient-resources/vascular-treatments/dialysis-access

In Part 2 of my conversation with Dr. Manaker, we discuss some of the common criticisms of the RUC, and why the group is structured the way it is. Long story short, it’s an imperfect group that was designed to most effectively do the otherwise overwhelmingly gargantuan task of determining the value of the procedures physicians bill for. For more background on the RUC and Dr. Manaker, check out Part 1.

https://soundcloud.com/pennhealthxpodcast/31-dr-scott-manaker-the-ruc-and-determining-how-much-physicians-get-paid

Dr. Scott Manaker is a an attending Pulmonary and Critical Care physician at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. I first heard about Dr. Manaker being at Penn when I fell down the rabbit hole researching a fascinating part of the U.S Healthcare system – a group called the Specialty Society Relative Value Scale Update Committee, or the “RUC” for short.

Dr. Manaker is a member of this group, and I felt really privileged to be able to sit down with him and pick his brain. I think you’ll find that rather than a secret organization that is sneakily carving up the healthcare dollars and distributing them as they see fit, they are a tenacious, dedicated group of specialists who are performing difficult, painstaking, and often thank-less work.

Links

AMA - RUC Websites

www.ama-assn.org/rvs-update-committee-ruc

www.ama-assn.org/about-us/composi…te-committee-ruc

www.ama-assn.org/rbrvs-overview

Articles Discussing RUC - some critical, some balanced

washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/julya…/special-deal/

replacetheruc.net/key-articles-not-here/

economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/10/…st=cse&_r=0

Today’s episode is the first of a two part conversation I had with Dr. Scott Manaker, who is a an attending Pulmonary and Critical Care physician at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. I first heard about Dr. Manaker being at Penn when I fell down the rabbit hole researching a fascinating part of the U.S Healthcare system – a group called the Specialty Society Relative Value Scale Update Committee, or the “RUC” for short.

Dr. Manaker is a member of this group, and I felt really privileged to be able to sit down with him and pick his brain. I think you’ll find that rather than a secret organization that is sneakily carving up the healthcare dollars and distributing them as they see fit, they are a tenacious, dedicated group of specialists who are performing difficult, painstaking, and often thank-less work.

Links

AMA - RUC Websites

https://www.ama-assn.org/rvs-update-committee-ruc

https://www.ama-assn.org/about-us/composition-rvs-update-committee-ruc

https://www.ama-assn.org/rbrvs-overview

Articles Discussing RUC - some critical, some balanced

https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/julyaugust-2013/special-deal/

https://replacetheruc.net/key-articles-not-here/

https://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/10/the-little-known-decision-makers-for-medicare-physicans-fees/?scp=1&sq=economix%20REinhardt&st=cse&_r=0

This episode is the final internship minisode with Christina Bax, who spent last summer working in Botswana with Peek Health, a company originally discussed on this podcast in one of our first episodes with Ryan Littman-Quinn. Christina talks about how she approached figuring out what to do over the summer, her role as a medical student with the Peek team, working with design students, and how she transitioned to living in Africa!

Links

Peek Vision

https://www.peekvision.org/

Upenn-Botswana Partnership

http://www.med.upenn.edu/botswana/

Episode with Ryan Littman-Quinn

https://soundcloud.com/pennhealthxpodcast/episode-3-ryan-littman-quinn-mhealth-and-botswana

This episode is a follow-up to the discussion with Dr. Alan Flake on fetal medicine and the artificial womb project. I speak with my good friend, and Penn Med classmate, Catherine Cullen about bioethics, and what we should think about as we continue to push forward, innovating in the realm of fetal medicine. With the advent of genomics, gene editing, and gene therapies, these types of conversations are more important now than ever. If you haven’t had the chance to listen to our episode with Dr. Flake, you definitely don’t want to miss out!

Links

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/08/health/artificial-wombs-ethics.html

https://www.vox.com/the-big-idea/2017/8/23/16186468/artificial-wombs-radically-transform-abortion-debate

Today we bring you a long-awaited, and incredibly special episode! This is an interview I, along with the new co-VP of curriculum for Penn HealthX, Raymond Liu, did with Dr. Alan Flake after he spoke at the Penn HealthX conference last semester.

Dr. Flake is an attending pediatric and fetal surgeon in the Division of Pediatric General, Thoracic and Fetal Surgery at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. He serves as Director of CHOP’s Center for Fetal Research and is a professor of Surgery and Obstetrics and Gynecology at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.

Today, he spearheads an active research laboratory focused on fetal stem cell and gene therapy. He has been at the forefront of cutting-edge studies aimed at treating genetic disorders before birth.

Among all of his accolades, he is probably most known for his current work on development of an artificial womb. Though the research is still being done with lambs, the hope is that in the coming years, a device will be available for preterm human babies to improve their morbidity and mortality.

Links

Press:

https://www.cnn.com/videos/health/2017/04/26/lamb-artificial-womb-study-jnd-orig-vstan.cnn

https://www.theverge.com/2017/4/25/15421734/artificial-womb-fetus-biobag-uterus-lamb-sheep-birth-premie-preterm-infant

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/sep/04/artifical-womb-women-ectogenesis-baby-fertility

CHOP's Center for Fetal Research

http://www.chop.edu/pages/center-fetal-research

Artificial Wombs

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_uterus

Part 2! This episode is a conversation I had with Dr. Nisha Mehta, who is a Penn Med alum! She is currently a radiologist, writer, speaker, and physician advocate. Her writing has been featured in Forbes, PBS NewsHour, Doximity, and KevinMD, among many others. She writes and speaks on many topics in medicine, including physician burnout, work-life balance, wellness, and personal finance. She is also the founder of the Facebook group, Physician Side Gigs, where over 15,000 physicians share stories of how they pursue passion projects both in and out of clinical medicine.

I first heard Dr. Mehta when she was a guest on the podcast Docs Outside the Box, and was so proud to see another amazing Penn Med alum out there making an impact. I’m thrilled to share this conversation with you all, and to join the Physician Side Gigs group in a few years.

Links:

Dr. Mehta's Website

www.nishamehtamd.com/

Physician Sig Gigs Facebook Groups

www.facebook.com/groups/physiciansidegigs

Some of Dr. Mehta's Writing

blog.doximity.com/articles/how-thi…ork-life-balance

opmed.doximity.com/the-physician-s…ig-8fde6355bf0f

www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/20…ebt/#4828d3847cf6

www.kevinmd.com/blog/post-author/nisha-mehta

Doc's Outside the Box Podcast

www.docsotb.com/

Side Hustles / Side Gigs

https://www.physiciansidegigs.com/side-gigs