Master Minds

Dr. Karen Joynt Maddox is the co-director of the Center for Health Economics and Policy at the Institute of Public Health here at WashU. By trade, she is both a Duke/Harvard-trained physician and health policy researcher. She now focuses on how to best improve healthcare administration—Where should hospitals funnel the most money into? What is the most equitable payment model? How do we make care more accessible across vulnerable populations? If you have ever asked any of these questions, but like me, have also been too turned off by American politics to research this stuff yourself, this episode is so for you.

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Dr. Nupur Ghoshal is a physician-scientist and associate professor of Neurology and Psychiatry at the WashU School of Medicine. She primarily treats patients with neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. Her research focuses on the tau protein, a molecule that forms neurofibrillary tangles in the brain and has shown to be a promising biomarker for Alzheimer’s. Dr. G is also a committed medical educator, holding many teaching positions throughout WashU at the undergraduate, graduate, and post-graduate levels. In this episode, we discuss the exciting “final frontier”-like aspect of neuroscience and how doctors and researchers at WashU are revolutionizing care for patients with neurological diseases. Title music: World Is Holding Hands by WinnieTheMoog https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode

Dr. Green is a physician and scientist in the Department of Pediatrics at the WashU School of Medicine. Her practice and research focus on the etiology of genome instability in pediatric cancers and the resulting genome-protective responses, also called DNA damage responses, that are central to them. She spent her residency and fellowship at the Children’s Hospital in Philadelphia and is double board certified in infectious diseases and hematology-oncology. Her journey to get where she is today is both exciting and impressive, and started at the mere age of 7 years old. In this episode, we discuss everything from how leukemia is diagnosed to how COVID-19 is affecting patient care. Title music: World Is Holding Hands by WinnieTheMoog https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode

Today, I’m talking to Dr. Julia Lopez—public health researcher, licensed social worker, and instructor at the Washington University School of Medicine. Dr. Lopez focuses her work on addressing gaps in research and clinical care in the areas of sexual and gender minority health, racial disparities, HIV care, and women’s health. Her goal is to provide a platform for these populations through practice, research and community collaboration. Title music: World Is Holding Hands by WinnieTheMoog https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode

Technology is heavily ingrained in the process of voting. From presidential polling to biased news sources and the media, the advent of digital communication has co-opted the process of informing ourselves and choosing the candidates we want to support. It seems that we are in need of a trusty third-party to hand us the facts. So today I’m talking with Terry Crandall—economics professor, realtor, entrepreneur, and founder of VotingSmarter, an unbiased, apolitical voting resource and app. Remember: “No more blind votes! No more election-night stands!” Title music: World Is Holding Hands by WinnieTheMoog https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode

Today I’m talking to Dr. Pankaj Vij, wellness physician, speaker, and author of the book Turbo Metabolism. Dr. Vij is passionate about preventing and reversing metabolic diseases by treating their root causes. He is a Director of the Lifestyle Medicine Global Alliance and the Chief Architect of Crack the Wellness Code - a global community platform for health promotion. Personally, I’m interested in his extremely successful holistic approach to medicine. Title music: World Is Holding Hands by WinnieTheMoog https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode