Pari Pandharipande, MD, has become chair of the department of radiology at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, and she's looking for AI to fulfill its promise for radiologists -- sooner rather than later.
In a conversation with Saurabh (Harry) Jha, MD, Pandharipande carries Episode 20 of the Keeping Up with the Radiologists podcast from AuntMinnie and Penn Radiology. Jha and Pandharipande discuss closing the gap between supply and demand in radiology, her stance on in-person meetings and teaching, and key components of being a radiology department chair.
"I say chair, but really any leadership position that involves overlooking multiple people," Pandharipande explained. "The first is being the leader, inspiring, identifying people, their needs. The second is the nuts and bolts of how things work, the administrative aspects. If you can't get things to work, then everything else kind of falls apart."
Recognizing strategies
Clinical operations, capital purchasing, faculty affairs, educational programs: "If you don't take the time to understand some of the nuts and bolts as to how those things work, you won't be able to develop or to recognize the best strategies for your department or organization moving forward," she said.
Pandharipande came into the workforce in 2006, having earned her medical degree at Weill Medical College of Cornell University. She said she was interested in finding an organization that could provide a hopeful career in academic radiology.
"I recognized I would have to build up my own research program, obtain funding, et cetera, to be able to go in the direction that I wanted to go," she explained. "What I worry about [today] is in trying to attract people to academic programs," she said, adding that the lines between academic and private practice have become blurred.
Pandharipande's background includes a diagnostic radiology residency at New York University Medical Center, and fellowships in cancer outcomes and abdominal radiology at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) in Boston. She eventually directed outcomes research at the MGH Institute for Technology Assessment and oversaw the clinical integration of Mass General Brigham's enterprise imaging services.
Understanding practice settings
"There I was immersed in very heavy clinical operations and understanding how that looked different between different institutions, different academic institutions, how that looked different between academic and community practices, what were some of the local regional drivers of care and how it happened, informatics, scheduling, the very nuts and bolts of radiology across the system," she explained. "What I realized was that there were skills that I needed in that role that drew from just pure leadership skills."
Prior to the University of Pennsylvania, Pandharipande spent three years at Ohio State University (OSU), where she served as chair of radiology and chief of radiology services for OSU Wexner Medical Center in Columbus. At OSU, Pandharipande led an NIH (R01)-funded research program centered in imaging and cancer outcomes.
With Jha, she discusses the challenges of leading clinical work, education, and research programs, as well as the similarities between MGH, OSU, and the University of Pennsylvania.
"I think in the end, one would be surprised as to how similar different organizations are when it comes to the sort of units of what we do every day," she said. "We're all trying to deliver excellent patient care."
To that end, Pandharipande hopes AI will improve radiologists' workflow sooner rather than later.
"Our field is looking for that," she says during the episode. "Certainly our department is. We have patients first, but I think a big part of impacting patients first is making that promise to our practicing radiologists tangible." Listen now.
Keeping Up with the Radiologists is hosted by Saurabh (Harry) Jha, MD, associate professor of radiology at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Jha obtained a master’s degree in health policy research from the Leonard Davis Institute at the University of Pennsylvania. He earned his medical degree from the United Medical and Dental Schools of Guy’s, King’s, and St. Thomas’ Hospitals. Jha developed Value of Imaging, a set of radiology educational resources.
Episode 20 of Keeping Up with the Radiologists is brought to you by AuntMinnie.com in collaboration with Penn Radiology. Check back for new episodes. You can also subscribe to the AuntMinnie Podcast Network through Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
