The Podcast by KevinMD

"No matter what, your healing work matters. No one should tell you otherwise, and nothing can change that, not even a shortcoming. You provide healing in a way no one else can. Care for yourself, and you can be the healer you truly wish to be." J. C. Sue is a family medicine resident. He shares his story and discusses his KevinMD article, "Self-care should now be your plan." Reflect and earn 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 CME for this episode.

Welcome to a special episode of The Podcast by KevinMD. In this 60-minute episode, I partner with DrFirst, a pioneer in health IT for over 20 years. We bring together physicians with different backgrounds to explore information overload and physician burnout. Dr. Sameer Badlani is chief digital officer, M. Health Fairview, a major health system in Minnesota. He is also adjunct faculty at Carnegie Mellon University. Dr. Colin Banas is chief medical officer, DrFirst. He was an internal medicine hospitalist and served as the chief medical information officer for VCU Health System in Richmond, VA. They share their stories and discuss the following questions: Based on your roles as physicians and as leaders in health IT, what are your insights into what is contributing to clinician burnout? How did you look at it differently when you became a tech leader? Did your perspectives change? Does tech sometimes contribute to burnout? How can tech best help burnout? What advice do you have for docs? For other IT leaders? Reflect and earn 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 CME for this episode.

"For me, my own personal stories of opioid patients come to mind, including one who keyed my car when I stopped prescribing his opioid after an acute injury. I think of some local opioid overdose deaths in my community. I would love to hear what other doctors and clinicians have to say about these issues, like the 'not responsible' verdict and the Sackler family running away liability-free and still worth billions of dollars. Does anybody feel like the opioid companies were pushy in the '90s and 2000s? Were they in the right? Is the California ruling in line with the common good? Are our prescribing practices under scrutiny? What runs through our heads right now, doctors? I would love to know." Rebecca Thaxton is a family physician. She shares her story and discusses her KevinMD article, "The people vs. opioid pharma: Pharma wins again." Reflect and earn 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 CME for this episode.

"Advanced analytics can provide the insights needed to understand social determinants and help develop interventions that assist patients in overcoming some of the challenges and adverse environmental and social factors that are barriers to healthier behavior. Analytics are needed to support the team-based approach to care delivery. With advanced analytics bringing together data on clinical and social needs, as well as health behaviors, providers and payors can enable effective care coordination and successfully implement value-based care models." Mike Dulin is a family physician and health care executive. He shares his story and discusses his KevinMD article, "How advanced analytics can help social determinants of health." Reflect and earn 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 CME for this episode.

"Guiding kindly illustrates mentorship, whether it be in the dojo or in an academic medical setting. Regardless of one's stage in medical training, certain errors in patient management will be made … this is part of the learning process. It is the role of the mentor (i.e., attending physician to resident, resident to medical student, attending physician to medical student) to help identify these errors, determine their causes, and work through solutions, while being cognizant of the educational level of the learner. Through all the chaos of the House of Pain, Doc would remind us to find calmness, controlling our breathing and minds. Above all, he encouraged us to pursue good health as good health precedes good life. If the House of Pain was a blacksmith, then its teachings are the forged, intangible swords I have gained to become a better man and future physician." Casey Paul Schukow is a medical student. He shares his story and discusses his KevinMD article, "What I learned about medicine in the House of Pain." Reflect and earn 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 CME for this episode.

"For too long have gardeners allowed our food supply to be dependent on mysterious logistics. We have criminally allowed our own food growing capacity to be displaced. Growing something you eat and trading with people who grow what you don't are ways to be less reliant on Big Food and its failed connections and also to help your neighbors. We have the opportunity to subvert the dominant supply chain. Local gardens and gardeners should be at the center of a new, three-part food supply chain — grow, share, eat." John La Puma is an internal medicine physician and author of ChefMD's Big Book of Culinary Medicine. He can be reached at What is Nature Therapy? He shares his story and discusses his KevinMD article, "Grow, share, eat: We have the opportunity to subvert the dominant supply chain." Reflect and earn 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 CME for this episode.

"The lack of diversity in academic medicine is a significant issue that can compromise our patients' health and the education of our training clinicians. There is a vicious cycle in which there are few black academic physicians, leading to seemingly fewer available mentors for black students, which in turn leads to even less of them pursuing careers in academic medicine. As a medical community at large, it is imperative that we understand the implications of this problem, not just on the black patient population, but on the nation as a whole. Its effects ripple through our economy and finances, public health/disease transmission, and educational infrastructure. Knowing this, it is more important now than ever that we promote diversity in academic medicine and to be more specific, that we encourage students, residents, and fellows to pursue such careers." Mary Branch is a cardiology fellow. She shares her story and discusses her KevinMD article, "Analyzing the deficit of African-Americans in academic medicine." Reflect and earn 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 CME for this episode.

"Through empathy-based training, physicians and other health care providers learn the skills to have honest informed consent discussions without causing undo fear, while also preparing patients for all possible outcomes. Empathic skills make for better physicians, better communications, and better conversations for all outcomes. With a strong alliance, a reduction in medical professional liability claims is the result of increased trust, better understanding and expectations of all possible outcomes, and knowledge that physicians deeply care about their patients, because, when it comes to health care, empathy matters." Helen Riess is a psychiatrist and author of The Empathy Effect: Seven Neuroscience-Based Keys for Transforming the Way We Live, Love, Work, and Connect Across Differences. She shares her story and discusses her KevinMD article, "The role of empathy in improving patient care and decreasing medical liability." Reflect and earn 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 CME for this episode.

"Today, more students are disclosing and speaking out about their disability and how their disability is an asset to their way of learning and what they can bring to their field. Across college campuses, more student-led organizations are forming to promote initiatives to identify and remove structural and systematic barriers to ensure equal access in all aspects of the educational experience. While aging clinicians may have had to live in the shadows with their disabilities, we have a new generation of aspiring clinicians who want to be "out" with their disability and share their experiences to bring more representation to their respective fields. It seems like a new generation of real superheroes is in the making." Marie Lusk is a social worker and disability specialist. She shares her story and discusses her KevinMD article, "Superheroes can have disabilities, too." Reflect and earn 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 CME for this episode.

"The classic thinking has always been that a career in medicine is more than just a job; it is a passion, a calling, an anchor of identity. There is a pervasive stigma in medicine against the self-advocacy of the worker. Bedside care providers who push back against their work/life imbalance are often made to feel guilty for putting themselves before their patients. Antiwork challenges those assumptions and inspires health care workers to reevaluate what role they want their jobs to play in their lives. The empathy and work ethic that inspired most of us to choose a career in medicine are not inexhaustible resources, and they should not be treated as such. Doctors and nurses can and should use their newfound bargaining power to demand better compensation, improved working conditions, and protected time to enjoy life outside of the hospital or clinic. The past year of working in medicine has been so enormously challenging that it has caused many to question how much we are willing to sacrifice for our jobs. This is a painful but necessary process. Learning from some of the lessons of antiwork can hopefully help us find a new balance that still allows us to care for our patients while taking better care of ourselves." Brendan James Flanagan is an emergency physician. He shares his story and discusses his KevinMD article, "What medicine can learn from the antiwork movement." Reflect and earn 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 CME for this episode.