CEO: Seek out and Apply best practices, measure the effect of changes and develop strategies to improve performance.
For non-traditional students there is often the idea that when you enter into the field of medicine you are to leave the old behind and pursue the new. For me, part of my motivation to pursue a career in medicine was propelled by the work I was doing in the field of public health. After studying public policy in undergraduate I pursued an MPH from Emory then went on to work for 2 years at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). At CDC I worked within the Division for Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention on knowledge translation. My work focused on taking scientific data and developing toolkits guides, webinars and policy briefs for state and county grantees. Additionally, I did a lot of work on creating evidence-based best practices particularly within the realm of program development and implementation.
As I have transitioned from working in the field of public health to medicine I have continued to think about the concept of evidence-based best practices and not only what is considered best practice but also how that is measured. During my clinical rotations there was a focus on being evidence based and using resources like UptoDate or field specific databases to determine the evidence behind a practice. I appreciated this perspective and the insistence of many attendings on knowing the evidence behind what I wanted to do for a patient. In some cases it was not always cut and dry, for example in psychiatry there were many times where the evidence was lacking or inconclusive and instead of depending on just the science we had to considered the art of experience and patient perspective.
Another way in which I have continued to engage with my public health background and continue in life long learning has been through the LSI curriculum. Health education and promotion is firmly intertwined into the curriculum. During my second year I participated in a interprofessional Community Health Education (CHE) project with students from the school or pharmacy, nursing and dietetics. The project, called the CarePoint East Patient Education Program (PEP Talk) aimed to improve the health of adults in the Near East Community who were at risk for metabolic syndrome. The Near East community of Columbus has a high rate of poverty, obesity and a large number of adults with low health literacy. The project used culturally competent health education to promote nutrition, physical activity, medication adherence and wellness. These areas were chosen to be representative of the participating students’ programs.
Photo from CPE Lifestyle Clinic: PEP Talk project which focused on using health promotion and health education delivered by an interdisciplinary team of students.
My goal is to continue utilizing my public health knowledge and experience to serve as an advocate. I hope to develop program and implement interventions to increase health equity particularly among underserved communities. Additionally, I think that advocacy at a population level has to involve policy. I hope to engage in advocacy for public health policies by working with public health organizations such as the Columbus Public Health Department and the CDC. Below is an image of a publication from work that I did while at CDC which was published last year.
Photo of accepted article published this year:
Hawkins, N. A., Bhuiyah, A. R.… Decker, A., … Schooley, M. (2019). A Replicable Approach to Promoting Best Practices: Translating Cardiovascular Disease Prevention Research. Journal of Public Health Management & Practice. Accepted for Publication.
