Well Beyond Medicine: The Nemours Children's Health Podcast

February is Black History Month and, to celebrate, the Well Beyond Medicine podcast welcomed colleagues from the Nemours Children's Health Black, African and Caribbean Heritage Associate Resource Group (ARG). They posed questions about diversity, equity, and inclusion to Black physician leaders across the Nemours Children's enterprise, including:

• Kara Odom-Walker, MD, MPH, MSHS, Executive Vice President, Chief Population Health Officer, Nemours Children's Health
• Alfred Atanda, MD, pediatric orthopedic surgeon, Surgical Director, Nemours Children's Center for Sports Medicine
• Lonna Gordon, MD, PharmD, Division Chief of Adolescent Medicine, Nemours Children's Hospital, Florida
• Cedric Von Pritchett, MD, pediatric otolaryngologist, Co-Director of Nemours Children's Ear, Hearing and Communication Center
• Robyn R. Miller, MD, Interim Division Chief of Adolescent Medicine and Pediatric Gynecology, Nemours Children's Hospital, Delaware

Featured members of the Nemours Children's Health Black, African, and Caribbean Heritage ARG:

• Danielle Davis-Evans, BSN, RN
• TeNeasha Billingsley, MSN, CPNP-AC
• Taynika Jones, BS
• Jane deHeer, PT, DPT, MBA, CLT
• Latonya Quann

Host/Producer, Carol Vassar

Views expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views of the host or management. 

Subscribe, review or let your voice be heard at NemoursWellBeyond.org.

Duchenne muscular dystrophy is the most common and severe form of muscular dystrophy. According to Nemours KidsHealth.org, it affects boys more often than girls. According to the Muscular Dystrophy Association, heart and respiratory muscle problems emerge in the teen years and can lead to serious complications. In terms of the heart, the issue at hand is cardiomyopathy.

Dr. Takeshi Tsuda is a pediatric cardiologist at Nemours Children’s Health who studies cardiomyopathy in boys with Duchenne. He joins this episode to talk about the unique qualities of cardiomyopathy in young teenagers with Duchenne muscular dystrophy, which have not previously been well characterized.

Guest:
Takeshi Tsuda, MD, Pediatric Cardiology
Nemours Children’s Health, Delaware Valley

Host/Producer: Carol Vassar

Views expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views of the host or management. 

Subscribe, review or let your voice be heard at NemoursWellBeyond.org.

Muscular dystrophy is a genetic disorder that makes the muscles of the bodies of those affected get weaker over time. There's no known cure, but there are treatments, and researchers continue to learn more about how to prevent and treat it.

In this episode, we discuss one specific type of genetic disorder: Duchenne muscular dystrophy, and learn about a new FDA-approved gene therapy that is bringing hope to families.

Learn More 

Guests:
Omer Abdul Hamid, MD, Neuromuscular Neurologist, Nemours Children’s Hospital, Florida
Rulla Starr, Neuromuscular Program Coordinator, Nemours Children's Hospital, Florida

Host/Producer: Carol Vassar

Views expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views of the host or management. 

Subscribe, review or let your voice be heard at NemoursWellBeyond.org.

When it comes to providing health services, the most precious resource of any healthcare system, hospital or provider's office is its people: those who make up the healthcare workforce. Yet the nation's expanding healthcare needs are outstripping the workforce size, creating a severe shortage of employees at all levels.

While there is no single solution to the healthcare workforce crisis, a unique partnership pairs Nemours Children's Health with the state's vocational-technical high schools to train high schoolers for healthcare careers. 

Guests:
Yvette Santiago, Director, Community Engagement, Nemours Children's Health, Delaware Valley
Margaret LaFashia, DNP, Director of Workforce Partnership Development, Nemours Children's Health, Delaware Valley
Kyle Hill, EdD, Principal, Howard High School of Technology of the New Castle County Vocational-Technical School District, Wilmington, Delaware
Deanna Lee, Certified Clinical Medical Assistant, Nemours Children's Hospital, Delaware, and student, Howard High School of Technology

Host/Producer: Carol Vassar

Views expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views of the host or management. 

Subscribe, review or let your voice be heard at NemoursWellBeyond.org.

The non-profit, non-denominational St. Patrick's Center in Wilmington, Delaware, has served that community for over half a century. They provide emergency food, meals, respite for the homeless, clothing, transportation, and recreational activities for people in need on the city's east side. Our guest host, Che Parker, met up with Joe Yacyshyn, St. Patrick's Center's Board Chair, as Nemours Children’s associates were conducting a clothing drive to benefit the organization's clients. They talked about the work of the St. Patrick's Center and the strong bond between this non-profit and Nemours Children's Health.

Carol Vassar, producer

Views expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views of the host or management. 

Subscribe, review or let your voice be heard at NemoursWellBeyond.org.

SEGMENT 1: Menstruation: it's something half of the world's population experiences. Yet having the right resources - access to period products and health information about menses can prove elusive for some due to financial concerns, lack of communication and openness on the topic due to stigma, or cultural and religious considerations.

Our topic with Nemours Children's Health adolescent medicine specialist Dr. Robin Miller is period equity- and how to achieve it.

Nemours Period Pantry Amazon Wish List

SEGMENT 2: A partner profile of Duffy's Hope, serving at-risk teens in Wilmington, Delaware, by providing them with one-on-one mentoring, tutoring, financial literacy, educational and enrichment trips, etiquette training, school and home visits, inspirational guest speakers, and group discussions.

Learn more about Duffy's Hope.

Carol Vassar, producer

Views expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views of the host or management. 

Subscribe, review or let your voice be heard at NemoursWellBeyond.org.

SEGMENT 1:  As children with congenital heart disease (CHD) become adults with adult congenital heart disease (ACHD), they continue to require specialized care and will need that care and monitoring for life. Find out why this is an important — and growing — area of specialty care.

SEGMENT 2:  It takes hours of preparation, planning and education by a multidisciplinary team before a high-risk pediatric cardiology patient can leave the walls of a hospital and head for home. Identifying risk factors and mitigating them at the point of discharge is key! Since 2019, the Supervised Family Care Program at the Nemours Children's Cardiac Center has been utilized to ensure the safe discharge of high-risk cardiac patients.

Guests:
Devyani Chowdhury, MD, MHA, Cardiologist, Medical Director, Adult Congenital Heart Disease Program, Nemours Children’s Cardiac Center, Delaware

Deepika Thacker, MD, Pediatric Cardiologist, Medical Director, Cardiac Inpatient Unit, Nemours Children’s Cardiac Center, Delaware

Dana Zingo, RN, Specialty Nurse, Nemours Children’s Cardiac Center, Delaware

 
Host/Producer: Carol Vassar

Views expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views of the host or management. 

Subscribe, review or let your voice be heard at NemoursWellBeyond.org.

In the final episode of our four-part series “Hot Topics in Neonatology” we explore neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS), a byproduct of prenatal drug exposure — one of the fastest growing public health problems in the world.

In the U.S., the most recent data from the CDC indicate that the number of pregnant people with opioid-related diagnoses documented at delivery increased by 131% from 2010 to 2017. The implications for their babies include preterm birth, still birth, birth defects and neonatal abstinence syndrome, or NAS.

SEGMENT 1: We talk with Dr. Ju-Lee Oei from the Royal Hospital for Women in Sydney, Australia, who provides an overview NAS — what it is, how it's diagnosed and how it's treated.

SEGMENT 2: Andre Sukta, a research and development projects manager at the United States Drug Testing Laboratories in Chicago, joins us to talk about the recent history of newborn toxicology screening.

Carol Vassar, producer/host

Explore the Full Series:
Part 1, Episode 50
The NICU View: Mom & Baby

Part 2, Episode 51
 Fluid Dynamics: What's New in Treating EPRA

Part 3, Episode 52
Fragile Beginnings: Exploring NEC in Newborns 

Views expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views of the host or management. 

Subscribe, review or let your voice be heard at NemoursWellBeyond.org.

In the third of our four-part series “Hot Topics in Neonatology” we talk with health care providers who are on the frontlines working to prevent adverse outcomes and improve the quality of care for the most vulnerable babies.

SEGMENT 1: Necrotizing enterocolitis  (NEC) is the most common and serious intestinal disease among premature babies. It’s so dire that preventing it has become the life’s work of many who treat pre-term babies, including Dr. Sheila Gephart with the University of Arizona College of Nursing in Tucson. Dr. Gephart and her team have created an NEC prevention protocol bundle that is showing promising outcomes, and she’s using a telementoring tool called Project ECHO to  “force multiply”  implementation and training around the protocol bundle to make large-scale change easier to accomplish at NICU level.

SEGMENT 2: Continued quality improvement (QI) is a high priority for every health care system at every level of care — and our nation’s NICUs are no exception. When working with the smallest of babies in the most precarious of medical situations, the principles of high reliability, the reliance upon evidenced-based protocols and practices, the ability to sustain success and to learn from failures are absolute necessities.

Neonatologist Dr. Hannah Fischer is Director of Quality Improvement and Safety for the Division of Neonatal Medicine at Norton Children’s Hospital in Louisville, Kentucky sits down with us to discuss her philosophy of NICU QI, bringing QI to NICUs across her state, and the quality measures that are critical in the first 60 minutes of the life of of a premature newborn — the so-called "Golden Hour".

Guests:
Sheila Gephart, PhD, RN, FAAN, Professor and Interim Chair, Division of Biobehavioral Health Sciences, University of Arizona, College of Nursing 
Hannah Fischer, MD, Associate Professor, Division of Neonatology at the University of Louisville 

Producer/Host: Carol Vassar

Full Series:
Part 1, Episode 50
The NICU View: Mom & Baby

Part 2, Episode 51
Fluid Dynamics: What's New in Treating EPRA
 
Part 4, Episode 53
Babies in Crisis: Understanding Neonatal Abstinence 

Views expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views of the host or management. 

Subscribe, review or let your voice be heard at NemoursWellBeyond.org.

We continue our four-part series “Hot Topics in Neonatology” with Part 2 that explores the latest in neonatology-related research and education with experts from across the United States.

SEGMENT 1: Amniotic fluid is the liquid that surrounds a baby during pregnancy, and it plays a key role in the development of the fetus. According to the March of Dimes, in the early weeks of pregnancy, the amniotic fluid is mostly water that comes from mom. After about 20 weeks, the baby’s urine makes up most of the amniotic fluid. There are instances, however, when there is fetal kidney disease. That means no urine, and no amniotic fluid. That is known as Early Pregnancy Renal Anhydramnios (EPRA), which is almost universally fatal. However, there is a new trial taking place in the U.S. — the RAFT Trial — which provides amniotic fluid replacement. Here to talk about this promising new development is Dr. Jena Miller, who serves as an assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Center for Fetal Therapy in Baltimore.

SEGMENT 2: According to the NIH, medical simulation allows the acquisition of clinical and non-clinical skills for use in a health care setting through deliberate practice. In simulation, trainees can make mistakes and learn from them without the fear of harming any patients. Dr. Rachel Umoren is a Neonatologist at the University of Washington and Seattle Children’s Hospital where she is the Director of the Neonatal Education and Simulation-Based Training Program. Her research focuses on improving neonatal outcomes globally through simulation-based education, and our wide-ranging conversation includes her work using a Smart-phone-based virtual simulation app to bring training to underresourced areas here and abroad.

Guests:
Jena Miller, MD, Assistant Professor, John Hopkins Center for Fetal Therapy
Rachel Umoren, MD, MS, Director, Neonatal Education and Simulation-Based Training Program, Seattle Children’s Hospital

Host/Producer: Carol Vassar

Full Series:
Part 1, Episode 50
The NICU View: Mom & Baby 

Part 3, Episode 52
Fragile Beginnings: Exploring NEC in Newborns

Part 4, Episode 53
Babies in Crisis: Understanding Neonatal Abstinence 

Views expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect the views of the host or management. 

Subscribe, review or let your voice be heard at NemoursWellBeyond.org.