Reflections on Service and Transition

As Dr. Murthy prepares to conclude his term as Surgeon General, the moment is , the moment is bittersweet: serving as Surgeon General has been the honor of his lifetime, and saying goodbye is hard.

For this second-to-last episode of House Calls, he calls on his my moai – friends and fellow physicians Dave Chokshi and Sunny Kishmore – to reflect on the issues he took and how serving as Surgeon General has shaped him. Dr. Murthy also shares his final act as Surgeon General: offering a Parting Prescription for America. It is a summary of what I have learned from my two terms, and what I believe will help heal the pain many people across our country are experiencing right now.

(02:51)    How is Dr. Murthy feeling days before his time in office ends?
(04:59)    What did it feel like to be asked to serve a second term as Surgeon General?
(06:41)    What was Dr. Murthy’s approach to figuring out what he wanted to work on in his second term?
(09:48)    What aspect of his work as Surgeon General does Dr. Murthy feel particularly resonated with the people he has served?
(15:47)    What did Dr. Murthy learn from his first term as Surgeon General that he brought to his second?
(19:37)    What was the biggest challenge of being Surgeon General?
(21:33)    What does Dr. Murthy think his children will remember about this time?
(23:53)    How has Dr. Murthy influenced the role of Surgeon General?
(25:53)    What personally caused Dr. Murthy angst while he was serving as Surgeon General?
(33:35)    What was the impact of his work on his family?
(39:17)    What is the power of unconditional love?
(43:41)    What is U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy’s “Parting Prescription”

For more episodes, visit www.surgeongeneral.gov/housecalls. 

For more episodes, visit www.surgeongeneral.gov/housecalls. 

Dr. Dave Chokshi, Physician & Public Health Leader 

Twitter: @davechokshi 

Dr. Sandeep (Sunny) Kishore, Physician-Scientist 

Twitter: @sandeep_kishore 

Instagram: @sunnyk5 

About Dr. Dave Chokshi & Dr. Sunny Kishore 

Dr. Dave A. Chokshi is a practicing physician and public health leader who most recently served as the 43rd Health Commissioner of New York City. From 2020-2022, he led the City’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, including its historic campaign to vaccinate over 6 million New Yorkers. Previously, Dr. Chokshi was the inaugural Chief Population Health Officer at the largest public healthcare system in the nation. He has held successive senior leadership roles that span the public, private, and nonprofit sectors. A Rhodes Scholar and White House Fellow, he is nationally recognized as a transformational leader, a clinical innovator, a policy expert, and a fierce advocate for a stronger and more equitable health system. 

Dr. Sandeep (Sunny) Kishore is a physician-scientist at the University of California, San Francisco. He has worked on closing the “know-do” gap and translating scientific insights into real-world applications with focus on chronic disease prevention & control. Currently, he is focused on developing a scalable treatment algorithm for blood pressure control to improve cardiometabolic health for primary care clinics across the University of California. His work has led to the addition of over ten treatments to the Essential Medicines List of the World Health Organization (WHO) for cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes and mental illness. He also has provided technical guidance to Resolve to Save Lives with a focus on fixed dose combinations for blood pressure and led large global networks focused on reducing the toll of chronic illness worldwide.  

Dr. Kishore completed his medical and graduate training at Weill Cornell/Rockefeller/Sloan-Kettering Institute and Oxford, undertook his clinical training at Yale and Brigham & Women's Hospital/Harvard Medical School and has held fellowships at Harvard, Yale and the Dalai Lama Center at MIT. He currently resides in the Bay Area with his wife.