October in Delhi was the venue of the Society of Emergency Radiology Conference held at my Alma Mater, the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, and ably organized by my colleague Dr Anjali Agrawal and the team from AIIMS led by Dr Atin Kumar. The conference was superbly organized with excellent hospitality and an outstanding curriculum, and was graced by international faculty including the legendary Dr Shan from Univ Maryland, Dr Aaron Sodickson and his partner Dr Khurana from the Brigham and Womens Hospital and Dr Dinesh Varma from Melbourne Australia. It was a particularly great pleasure for me to speak on the stage of the AIIMS auditorium where I attended and participated in so many events as a medical student and
Radiology resident, in front of esteemed AIIMS faculty that had taught me including Prof Berry, Prof Goulatia, Prof Arun Gupta, Prof Sanjiv Sharma and my good friend Prof Raju Sharma who was my senior resident when I was a PG here from 89-92. The SER has shaped into an excellent learning experience and the lectures were of uniformly high quality. An interesting experience for was moderating the film reading session on the first morning which I tried to keep fun and light, although of course the emphasis was on the cases which were nailed by the panelists which included Dr Shan, Dr Bodanapalli and Dr Geetika Khanna from Mallinckrodt. I also had a talk on Emergency Teleradiology in a session in which Anjali spoke on the vision of the Emergency Radiology Society and Prof Khandelwal from PGI spoke on the proposed Fellowship in Emergency Radiology. Several excellent exhibit presentations by TRS radiologists Dr Vandana, Dr Monika, Dr Amit and Dr Chethana also added to the buzz for our group.
The SER is a new society launched just a year ago, and in some ways ahead of its time. Next year’s conference will be organized by us in Bangalore at the end of September along with our colleagues at Vydehi Institute, led by Professor Ramprakash. An exciting event to look forward to and a lot of work to be done!
November was marked by my US trip for the RSNA. I travelled to Philadelphia a week before Thanksgiving with the dual goals of visiting some of our clients in the Philadelphia area as well as covering the Thanksgiving holiday and giving some of my colleagues a holiday break.
Although it was the centennial RSNA it was quite a muted one, with apparently fewer attendees, fewer booths, and smaller booths. Many of the Telerad companies who had previously exhibited did not have a booth. I had an interesting experience wherein I was invited by GE to meet with Jeff Immelt, Global CEO – it turned out to be a closed roundtable with only 12 attendees including the Chairmen of the top US radiology departments and individual radiologist representatives from Japan and China and Latin America and myself – so I discovered that I was the designated representative from India- and was required to give the India perspective on the next decade in Radiology. Jeff Immelt who is an affable and engaging person, outlined his vision of the next decade in radiology which he said will be focused on managing large data effectively to extract key analytic information that can improve efficiency and patient outcome. Other interesting meetings were with Dr Steve Pomeranz of Proscan and we discussed ways in which Proscan and Radguru can collaborate to mutual benefit. I also met with one of our recent Radguru efaculty, Dr Raghu Vikram from MD Anderson Institute.
Attending the Yale and Cornell reunions was part of the evening enjoyment. And a magical RSNA blues evening where my friend Doc’o’rock Ari Mintz played blues guitar along with a bunch of talented blues musicians. The theme of RSNA this year seemed focused on data management with the goal of improving radiologist efficiency and delivering greater value to patients and referring physicians.
A colleague recently forwarded me an article from the Guardian http://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/jul/19/doctors-best-hospital-managers-new-research which in turn quotes an article from the Cass Business School in London based on data from the NHS in the UK which states that Doctors make better managers. I ascribe to this philosophy. In fact I take it a step further to a thesis that doctors make better (or at the very least, good) entrepreneurs as well.
I have spoken on this subject in the past and my reasons for making this statement are as follows
1. Doctors are naturally hardworking and dedicated, a trait that serves well in the early years of any entrepreneurial venture ( and for that matter later as well)
2. Doctors are typically smart and at the top of their class in school
3. Doctors tend to have better people skills than the median, as they are more empathetic and caring – this is an HR advantage
4. Doctors tend to be good communicators – both written and verbal, based on their training.
5. Doctors are used to crisis situations, even those of the extreme life and death kind, which make them well equipped to deal with crises.
6. Doctors are used to multitasking (any intern who has done a night duty in a surgical ward will confirm this)
7. Doctors are used to processing large amounts of data in short periods of time, and to retaining them as well – this is the essence of medical school education
8. Doctors are required to take calculated risks in the course of medical practice, as the course of care of a patient may not always follow a predictable or reliable course.
9. Doctors are extremely well aware of their fallibilities and weaknesses as their failures are revealed to them daily in the course of medical practice, and through the rigorous system of medical error detection and continuing education
10. Finally Doctors typically have good positive energy.
I realize of course that these are all broad generalizations, and that there would certainly be significant exceptions. However I think the number of physician entrepreneurs and managers at healthcare business conferences is evidence that there is at least a grain of truth in this concept.
Of course, the benefit doctor entrepreneurs reap is a deeper understanding of their own healthcare space/domain, (which was certainly true in my own case). If the knowledge is in turn driven by passion and sincerity, much that is transformational in healthcare can be achieved by physician entrepreneurs.
May their tribe increase!