Healthcare and Science / Geographic Disparities And Volunteerism

Healthcare and Science / Geographic Disparities And Volunteerism

25 Feb 2022

This panel moderated by Tony Tannoury, assistant Professor of Orthopaedic Surgery at Boston University School of Medicine & Director of Spine Services at Boston Medical Center, encompasses healthcare systems changes due to Covid-19 and discussions on the benefits of technology merging with healthcare. The panelists spoke their minds regarding their routines, healthcare settings, and different opportunities to change and grow instilled by the pandemic. Jeffrey Hammoudeh, a Reconstructive Plastic Surgeon and Associate Professor of Clinical Surgery at Keck School of Medicine USC spoke about his effort at looking at challenges to build something better through tele-learning and increasing healthcare providers' skills using the internet. Walid Alami, an interventional cardiologist at Chesapeake and Washington Heart Care, shared the story of his “exodus” from Lebanon to the USA and his experience in Lebanese Palestinian camps, what is missing from structures to human capital at the receiving end of the bridge he tried to build. He then spoke of how history has taught us not to learn from history in Lebanon, and how a state exercises domestic ethnic cleansing against its people. Powerful messages to bring about change through awakening minds and hearts to the state of reality we live in. Zayd ElDada, Director of Cardiac Electrophysiology at MedStar Heart & Vascular Institute, believed that Covid has made us change our lifestyle. He said that doctors and health care providers have stories about how they made their will in front of their children because they did not know what would happen to them. For him, being human means that we have to change this disparity between being consumers to become contributors and turning the situation around in favour of contributing. As for Dr. Dana Khutaila, a New York City double board-certified plastic surgeon certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery and the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, she felt that the major obstacles in her field were managerial, having to do with disparities in gender equity, especially in Arab countries, where in contrast, in Canada, she was able to get her privileges as a practicing surgeon, immediately.