Dr. Shantanu Nundy: Chief Medical Officer at Accolade (Raise the Line)

Hi, I'm Shivani. Thanks for checking out our raise the line interview series.

In which me and my cohost osmosis chief Medical Officer Dr Rishi Desai explore how to strengthen our healthcare system with some amazing leaders in medicine, technology, education and government and they have some great advice for people starting careers in healthcare as well.

I hope you'll watch these highlights and then go listen to the full podcast interview wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Shivani and today on a raise the line, I'm really happy to be joined by a long time colleague, Doctor Sha Nn.

Doctor NDI is the Chief medical officer at Accolade, which is a personalized health and benefit solution for employers health plans and their members.

He's also a practicing physician and technologist with expertise, blending medicine and innovation along with deep knowledge of the healthcare industry and global health.

How did you get interested in medicine? And then can you walk us through a bit of your career trajectory?

Blending both practice and uh and, and, and now working, uh you know, one of the most successful healthcare companies, my parents aren't doctors or anything like that, you know, uh I was sick a lot as a kid.

So I was definitely interested. Um, but for me, my really form of experience was when I was in, um, college, I used to spend my winter breaks.

My family runs like a small nonprofit in India. And so I went to go teach English and, uh, all my students there, to me, you know, as a 17 year old seemed really sick.

And so I ended up starting uh a school based uh uh healthcare program uh for this small school, just, just uh a few 100 kids.

And over time with some support from my college ended up setting up a clinic. And like that was, it was pretty uh I think magical for me, you know, this idea that, you know, uh you could, yeah, that doctors, you know, to see if see somebody for a few minutes uh can make them feel better, can solve their issues.

Uh And that was just deeply inspiring for me. So that, that's how I ended up in medicine, you know, given that our audience is primarily current and future healthcare professionals and you are a healthcare professional.

Uh What advice would you give them about meeting the challenges of the COVID pandemic and, and beyond? Well, first of all, super excited uh that you guys are entering this amazing profession.

You know, it's given me more personally than I could possibly give back. And I think my biggest, you know, two advice maybe is one is there's a time and a place for everything in your career, learning the basics of basic science, you know, learning, you know how to take a history from a patient, how to build trust with families.

Those are really special moments. And I think as sort of an eager beaver, I was always trying to do the next thing and the next thing and I think, I wish I had gone back and really taken advantage of what medical training was at that moment in my training.

And then the other one is a little bit counter to that, which is, you know, you do have to find the thing that, that, that, that spark for you, right?

Like for me, it might be building some stuff, whatever it is for you and finding outlets to carry that through. Like I used to be, I used to be much more cynical.

My biggest advice me, they say like, what's my biggest advice? Should I study this?

Should I do this? Should I do this for a day?

So my biggest advice is don't change because for most people who go through medical school and training, they actually lose that spark, they lose the joy, they lose the purpose and you have it right now, you know, as you start school, you have it and you have to find a way to kind of turn continue to renew, you know, that energy that you have cause on the other side, when you have time and you have the expertise like the world needs you.

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