The Activist: Kelly Thibert, DO, MPH

Dr. Kelly Thibert is a family medicine physician practicing in Bradenton, Florida. She graduated from Grant Family Medicine Residency in Columbus, Ohio where she received comprehensive training enabling her to provide primary care to a full spectrum of patients and populations. She attended the University of Central Florida in Orlando, Florida where she majored in Molecular and Microbiology and minored in Women’s Studies. She attended Nova Southeastern University College of Osteopathic Medicine in South Florida where she earned her Doctorate in Osteopathic Medicine and Master of Public Health degrees. Before applying to residency, Kelly served as the National President for the American Medical Student Association (AMSA), focusing on physician and trainee wellness, reproductive healthcare including abortion, LGTBQ healthcare and fighting for quality, affordable healthcare for all. She now serves as the AMSA Foundation President and Chair, still on the mission of helping physicians in training use their voices to improve medicine and medical education. She believes that being involved in health policy and advocating for change are vital to ensuring fully comprehensive care for her patients and the communities in which they live. Kelly is passionate about comprehensive reproductive health – including abortion, health policy, medical education and social activism.

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Dr. Thibert’s Prescription for Success:

Number 1: Find what brings you joy, and keep doing it.

Number 2: Say yes to opportunities, even if they scare you. But you can also say no.

Number 3: It’s ok to ask for help.

Number 4: Apply to that job or leadership position, even if you feel that imposter syndrome.

Connect with Dr. Thibert

Twitter: @ktotus
Website: amsa.org

Notable quotes from Dr. Thilbert’s interview:

Go into every rotation with an open mind.

I truly love family medicine and all we can do in our specialty

Health knows no zip code. Health is not confined to the exam rooms.

We need more just means of healthcare in our society.


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Access the Show Transcript Here

Transcript

[0:00] Understanding our patients and where they come from and the social injustices or the harms and barriers that have been placed in their way that truly impact their health or their ability to have the highest attainable health that they can have.

[0:15] That’s what we need to understand. Yes, all the science and the medicine is of the utmost importance. That was what we have to learn as physicians, but this other part of it would really help us to raise the level of health care that we can deliver to a higher degree.
And I think that we should incorporate those things. Paging Dr. Cook.

[0:37] Paging Dr. Cook. Dr. Cook, you’re wanted in the OR. Dr. Cook, you’re wanted in the OR. Welcome to the Prescription for Success podcast with your host, Dr. Randy Cook. Dr. Cook, you’re wanted in the OR.

[0:42] Music.

[1:06] Welcome to the Prescription for Success podcast with your host, Dr. Randy Cook. Hello everyone and welcome to Prescription for Success. I’m Dr. Randy Cook, your host for the podcast, which is a production of MD Coaches, providing leadership and executive coaching for physicians by physicians.

[1:22] To overcome burnout, transition your career, develop as a leader, or whatever your goal might be, visit MD Coaches on the web at MyMDCoaches.com, because you’re not in this alone.

[1:37] And don’t forget that CME credit is available when you listen with us. Just look for CMFI in the show notes to learn how.

[1:46] My guest today is a family medicine physician in Bradenton, Florida. And she’s also a past president of the American Medical Student Association, where she continues to work with AMSA as their foundation president and chair.

[2:03] So let’s hear my conversation with Dr. Kelly Tibbert. So we’re having a conversation today with Dr. Kelly Tibbert, who is a family practitioner down in Bradenton, Florida.
Kelly, it’s so nice to have you on the show today and thank you so much for being with us. Thank you so much for having me here.
I have a feeling that there are people that might be listening to the podcast who are not aware of exactly where Bradenton, Florida is. Do you want to give us a little geography and locate yourself for us?

[2:35] Absolutely, yes. So I’m on the west coast of Florida, and the best explanation would be about an hour south of Tampa and just about 30 minutes north of Sarasota.

[2:46] So many people vacation here or summer here, so they’ll probably know those two destinations a lot more so than Bradenton.
I happen to be very familiar with the area. I practiced for about 13 years in Clearwater. Well, I’m sure the people that are going to listen to us from Chicago are going to be envious,
but again, it’s nice to have you. So let’s get into the conversation. And as is always the case,
Callie, we want to begin at the beginning. Have you always been a Florida resident? Is Florida home to you? Yes, Florida is home. I’m a true Floridian through and through. I was born in,
in South Florida in Fort Lauderdale, which is just north of Miami.
And I grew up there and did my undergraduate training at the University of Central Florida, which is in Orlando, famous for Disney, of course.
And then I did my medical school training in, again, back in South Florida, Nova Southeastern University College of Osteopathic Medicine.
And that’s where I obtained my medical degree and my master’s of public health degree.

[3:51] And it wasn’t until I got into some work with the American Medical Student Association that I ventured out of Florida and called other places home for some time.
I see. Well, if you will, I wanna talk a little bit more about your early life. I’m always interested to know how people found an interest in medicine.
Was it like a childhood dream for you or was it something that occurred to you later in life when you decided to go to medical school?
Yeah, it was actually something a little bit later in life. Growing up, I was actually really into competitive dancing and so always had my eye on being a professional dancer and also a teacher.
I know two very different things, but when I got into high school, is where I really started to get to know the sciences. Nobody in my immediate family or in my household had yet gone to college.
My older brother was the first one to attend college and nobody in my family and still currently practices any form of medicine or in the medical field.
So it was kind of out of left field that I even considered a pathway to medicine. And so when I got into high school, I had this wonderful anatomy and physiology teacher,
Mr. Kaplan, and I did basic anatomy and physiology classes.

[5:09] With him and at the very end of the semester, we got into dissections, which was really great, especially for a high school student.
And we got to dissect some things a little bit more than a frog and a worm.
And it was, it was really interesting to me how the bodies of those creatures managed to keep them alive and going and how intricate it was.
And the science behind it just awed me. And so I remember one day I asked him, Mr. Kaplan, how do I dissect for a living was my question.
And he said, you know what?
Yeah, he said, I think you want to go to medical school. And I said, why would I go to medical school? What does that even mean?
Who goes to medical school? And he said, well, I think you want to be a doctor. And you know, sure enough, I started looking around
to see what does it mean to go to medical school and what types of careers do people have? What are the different types of doctors? I came across this pretty renowned medical
examiner. Her name is Dr. G. She was working in the Orlando area at the time. She had a show on TLC. At that moment, I thought, this is it. I’m going to go to medical school and I’m going to be a medical examiner.
And so from 10th grade forward, that was my goal.

[6:36] Oh, geez. That’s really fascinating that you were first captivated by the science, but clearly something happened and you decided to shift from forensic pathology to family medicine. How did that come about?
Yes, so as I progressed, again, in high school was a lot of my first exposures to different areas of the world.
So the very next year I actually was afforded the opportunity to take a women’s studies course, which they don’t have in many high schools.
And that started to open my eyes to a lot of social injustices in our world, in our communities.
And that was something that really grabbed my attention. And so for a while I sat on the fence of these two things I was very passionate about,
science, the dissections, and then also ways to get involved to create change for the better for our communities through a social justice lens.

[7:36] And then as I progressed to college, I veered down these two tracks, which I thought were parallel, you know, I didn’t think there would ever be an intersection between the two.
So again, I told the line of I’m pre-med at this point, I was at UCF studying my initial degree of chemistry following the footsteps of my organic chemist brother, which was a
terrible idea, but then transitioned to molecular and microbiology, but also minoring in women’s studies at the same time.

[8:08] And it wasn’t until probably a year and a half into my undergraduate work that I realized, one, forensic pathology probably wasn’t going to fulfill me because I wanted my career to
encompass all of these things I was passionate about. So I started leaning towards obstetrics and gynecology at that point, especially because I had this strong focus in reproductive health and
reproductive justice. And it was an undergraduate that I decided I was also going to become an an abortion provider and I needed to figure out how to do that. And at that point, I thought,
only OB-GYNs could do it. And so throughout my time in undergrad, I was still on the OB-GYN track actually until I got into medical school and medical school then opened more opportunities for me to really experience the different specialties.
Yeah. And luckily, I had a lot of really great mentors who advised me, keep your mind open. Yes, you say you want to be an OB-GYN right now, but go into every rotation with an open mind and an open heart and soak it up and see how you feel about it.

[9:15] So through my clinical rotation, third year of med school, I loved every single rotation. You know, I was going to be a trauma surgeon.
I was going to be a pediatrician. I was going to be an internist or an intensivist.
It was the end of medical school when I got to rotate with this family medicine doctor who was working at an FQHC.

[9:44] And he was in the community, you know, living and working in this community. They all knew him by first name.
He was doing HIV care. He was doing STI treatments and really involved in the public health of the community.
And that’s when I realized, hey, that’s the doctor I want to be. I want to incorporate all my knowledge of public health and social justice and getting to know my patients on a more intimate level outside of the clinical exam room as more than just a chart to me. And that’s when it clicked that I wanted to be a family medicine physician. So it actually was really late in medical school, and it was the best decision I have ever made. It is by far my best and happiest choice because I truly love family medicine and all that we can do in our specialty. Dr.

[10:44] I think it’s kind of unusual at the undergraduate level to run into people that are interested simultaneously in scientific issues and more human interest issues.
And yet you were certainly one of those people.
And I’m wondering in those courses that you took in women’s studies, were you the only scientist, the only pure scientist among the group, or did you find other science-like people that had similar interests to yours or not?
That’s a really good question. You know, I hadn’t ever reflected on that before, but thinking back to the folks who were in my classes and especially where they are now, I was the only pure science major,
who was there in those courses, at least that I know of, you know, who were in my close circle within those courses.

[11:36] Hadn’t ever occurred to me previously. Well, let me ask you this.
I think most people who have been to medical school would attest that we get fairly well immersed in the sciences and the mathematics during our undergraduate years in an effort,
to prepare ourselves for medical school.
Do you think it would be overall beneficial to medical education to encourage more students to do some more courses in the social sciences?
I absolutely think that it would be beneficial. So much so that I honestly for years have thought that it would be beneficial for every medical student or physician in training,
you know, to have public health training from the public health classes and courses.
They are so intertwined between the humanity, you know, of the folks we’re serving and the policies that are being made that are impacting their health to what we can do and either have barriers to or are accessed to in our exam rooms.
I think it’s so important to get just the breadth of knowledge of who we’re truly serving because as we know you know like health knows no zip code health is not confined to the exam rooms and.

[12:54] Understanding our patients and where they come from and the social injustices or the harms and barriers that have been placed in their way That truly impact their health or their ability to have the highest attainable health that they can have
that’s what we need to understand. Yes, all the science and the medicine is of the utmost importance. That was what we have to learn as physicians, but this,
other part of it would really help us to raise the level of health care that we can deliver to a higher degree and I think that we should incorporate those,
things. Hi, I’m Rhonda Crowe, founder and CEO for MD Coaches. Here on RX for Success, we interview a lot of great medical professionals on how they grew their careers, how they overcame challenges, and how they handle day-to-day work. I.

[13:41] Really hope you’re getting a lot of great information, but if you’re looking for an answer to a specific problem, management or administration challenge.

[13:50] Or if you’re feeling just a bit burnt out like maybe you chose the wrong career, well then there’s a faster way to get the help you need. No, it’s not counseling, it’s coaching. Rx4Success is produced by MD Coaches, a team of physicians who have been where you are. I know you’re used to going it alone, but you.

[14:09] Don’t have to. Get the support you need today. Visit us at MyMDCoaches.com to schedule your complimentary consultation. Again, that’s MyMDCoaches.com because you’re not in this alone.

[14:28] Dr. Reagan We’ll get back to our interview in just a moment, but right now I want to tell you a little bit about Physician Outlook. If you haven’t discovered this remarkable magazine, please do so very soon.
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Rx for success and select the monthly option at checkout. That’s a really great deal on this stunning publication. And now let’s get back to today’s interview.
Darrell Bock Well, I’m very impressed that you decided to do it that way.
And I agree with you. I think we could do ourselves well if we would concentrate more on creating, they used to say the Renaissance man, but the Renaissance people with a rather broad understanding
of not only the sciences, but their arts and the literature and all those things. And it sounds like you and I are in agreement on that. And I’m very happy to hear that. Let’s move you on to.

[16:02] Your postgraduate training, which you decided to do in Columbus, Ohio. That seems like a little bit of a jump for a South Florida lady. So how did you make that decision?
Yes, that is quite the jump and it was quite the learning curve to go to living in the Midwest where it snows.
Probably that was not the best choice, but I will say my residency program was the best choice.
You know, initially when I made my rank list, it was mostly on the coasts, of course, you places in like Boston, California, Colorado, and I thought I was set. And then I ended up seeing one day, you know, some of my friends from the American Medical Student Association from AMSA,
who I had been leaders with throughout, you know, undergrad and med school, they were,
at this residency program in Columbus, Ohio. And I knew that neither of these folks were from the Midwest, specifically from Ohio. And so I reached out and I said, What are you doing there? Why are
are you at this program? What’s going on?” And you know, I got some information about Grant Medical Center and about the Family Medicine Residency Program and it It really sparked my interest.
So I submit an application, I interviewed.

[17:21] And it had everything I was looking for. You know, it was a public hospital, a community-based hospital, one where the family medicine residents were unopposed. And so, you know, the family
medicine residents were doing the hospital admissions, doing the ICU work, running the codes, doing septic shock alerts, delivering the babies, participating if they wanted to in C
sections, participating in centering pregnancy and medication-assisted therapies for substance use disorder and starting up gender-affirming care.
There was just everything. And the fact that there was this powerhouse family medicine residency program in Ohio truly boggled my mind.

[18:06] The people who came out of that program, at least that I had looked at previously as we we all do our research before we apply to programs.
They were these really strong family physicians with a lot of passion for their communities and the ability to, once they graduated from the program,
the ability to do whatever they wanted in family medicine, whether that was a little bit more specialized in sports medicine or truly being a comprehensive,
family medicine doc, either going to rural parts of the states or staying as a hospitalist,
which is a little rare to see coming straight out of residency.
And then aside from that, they really had social missions that supported the things that I was also interested in. So the different justice perspectives and the way that they viewed resident treatment and really honored.
That connection between teacher and student and the team as a whole. So to say the least, I went, I interviewed, I changed my rank list the moment I left.
They were number one on my list and I matched there and it was the most incredible training I could have ever asked for and I’m truly appreciative of the Grant Family Medicine Residency.
I like it when somebody lands in a place where they feel like they belong And we’ll probably talk some more about that in a moment, but there is a particular part of your.

[19:32] Story that I really want to shine some light on. And that actually began while you were still in medical school when you became a part of the American Medical Student Association. So you
want to tell us how that came about? Yes, absolutely. I joined the American Medical Student Association or AMSA, as I’ll call it, moving forward here in undergraduate at the
the University of Central Florida. So I’ve been connected with this association for over 12 years now. But I joined it because as I had mentioned earlier, nobody in my family,
had been involved in the medical field. And so I joined this organization to really point me in the direction of like, Hey, how do I get into medical school? What are the steps?
What’s necessary? It was our typical, you know, pre-med club on campus. So I joined it but then you know they started advertising that there were national meetings or you know
regional meetups and I was like what is going on here so I actually attended I was like oh this is more than just at my my college I had no idea so I went to the national convention,
and quickly got the AMSA juice and and learned what AMSA was all about and it’s so tightly fit with who I felt as a person and physician that I wanted to be.
The person who stands up for our patients, who advocates, who insists that we need more just means of health care and our society.

[20:58] And it was my people, so to speak. These people were all like minded in terms of wanting to make good changes, and they were also interested in those humanities that we spoke about before,
but we’re also going to be doctors, which I didn’t find on my local campus as readily.
So it was really wonderful being able to combine my two passions. Then from there, things just kept going.
I became a local leader at UCF, I became a national leader when I attended several meetings at the national level.
And from there was able to climb this leadership ladder to the point where I started to serve on the AMSA Association Board in multiple roles and eventually was elected as the AMSA national president, which was truly so far the highlight of my career.
It’s been so wonderful to have served in that capacity to help physicians in training to really get our voice and ideas out there for the world to see.
And so that was a really pivotal, pivotal time of my training. Yeah, I bet it was.
And let’s talk about that a little bit, what that actually meant by serving as the president of the national organization. You actually had to take a year off, as I understand it, to be the president. This was something that happened between medical school and residency. Have I got that right?

[22:23] Yes, you’re exactly right. So yeah, the AMSA national president role is a full-time job. The president is expected to be available 24-7 in case things come up and to respond to news cycles and to be present for meetings or requests from different news outlets or legislators.
So I graduated from medical school.

[22:46] And probably two days after graduating, moved to Washington, DC, because at least prior to COVID, we were a lot, of course, a lot more in person, less virtual. And so the national president would
typically move to the DMV area so that we could be present on the Hill as much as possible so that we could get our voice out there, make these connections and really get to work on the issues that were,
important to us. And so I moved there and that year was so much travel. I got to travel all around the country to a lot of different meetings to meet up with folks from different associations that we would partner with. I traveled to a lot of our local chapters in different places, including.

[23:31] A few that were established in the Dominican Republic. And I also got to travel over to to Montenegro to serve as the spokesperson for medical students from the United States at what’s called the IFMSA and just bring our perspective from the states.
And those were really important pivotal times and we got to do a lot of great things that year. We focused on a lot of issues as it related to the ACA, as it related to reproductive health and justice.
Year we focused a lot on gun violence as a public health issue as well, especially in the wake of the Pulse shooting, which of course was near and dear to my heart, having been,
a person who frequented that facility frequently as an Orlando college student.
And I got to attend meetings at the White House as a voice for medical students as it related to the opioid epidemic.
So really a lot of great opportunities to uplift medical student voices and what we hope the future of medicine should look like. I bet that was an exciting year for you and I’m going to go ahead and ask the question that I’ve…

[24:43] Suspect that many of our listeners will have, and that is if you take a year off after medical school to function in a more administrative role, did you find any difficulty in getting the RPMs up to speed when you went on to your residency, or did you just kind of drop right.

[25:04] In and pick up where you left off?

[25:05] Yeah, that was one of my biggest fears. However, I knew a lot of presidents had done it before me with ease, and so that kind of ease my mind a little bit. I will say, you know, there were some programs that gave me a little bit of pushback about having quote unquote a year off and not necessarily.
Well, I thought about that.
Yeah, not looking at the work I was doing. But I felt as though I was more intimately involved with healthcare than maybe a lot of my peers had been in their last few months
of say fourth year medical school. I was up to date on all the current policies, what were affecting our patients and things that I could expect coming down the pipeline. I knew way too much about coding before even going into residency because of those things, but that was good.
I think looking back when I dropped into intern year, we were all pretty much at the same level, trying to keep our head above water and not being scared to prescribe Tylenol,
at 3 a.m. when you’re on the floor. So it turned out pretty well and luckily had a strong program to help me out and keep me afloat.

[26:13] And so the people at Grand Medical Center didn’t really give you any pushback on that to speak of?
Absolutely not. They were thrilled to have somebody who had been doing the work that I had and I think they perceived my passion of the work that I had done and I think they also knew that I was so passionate that I would probably try to make some changes at their institution as well.
And so let’s talk about where you are now. You’re still tightly associated with AMSA, and I’m not sure what the official title is.
It looks like president and chairperson, but I thought that’s what you were doing before. Tell me what your role is with AMSA at this point.

[26:53] Yes. So I am the president and chair of the board, but of the AMSA Foundation, no longer of the Association.

[27:01] Not the Association, but the Foundation, yeah. Correct.
So the foundation of AMSA is a group of, you know, we have some members who are from the Association Board, which includes the current national president of the Association, along with some other medical students and residents, but a lot of alumni as well in current past,
presidents. And our goal from the foundation perspective is to be there as advisors if the Association needs it to really help guide, of course, different grant funding to projects
that the association wants to do. We take all of our guidance from them in terms of what our focus is for the year and then just help however we can to support and uplift,
the work that they’re doing as an association. So we work very tightly together, but a little.

[27:47] Bit different than the association presidential role.
So you’ve morphed from the enthusiastic upstart to the wise advisor.
I’d hope so. Hopefully other people would give you that feedback about me. Yeah, I do love being there and being present for the physicians in training, absolutely.
It sounds like a really rewarding organization to be associated with and I congratulate you for that. Let’s talk a little bit about your current practice. I gather it is, for the most part,
a sort of as you would expect family practice type of day-to-day life for you, is that right?
Yeah, that’s absolutely right. So I’m an employed physician. I work eight to five, Monday through Friday in my ambulatory clinic. On weekends, I do travel to still provide abortion
care in Florida too, which is something that’s a little bit different from just the general outpatient family doc. Yeah, I bet it is. I’m really interested to know a little bit more about about your decision to become politically visible and politically active and also some of the causes,
that you’re enthusiastic about.
Can you just talk to us about that a bit?
Yeah, absolutely. A lot of the things that I am passionate about are probably more political or social issues that truly affect folks who have been.

[29:16] Marginalized for as long as they can remember and their ancestors can remember. And as somebody who is a member of one of those communities of the LGBTQ community, I have always found that I want
to provide to people the types of care that are hard to find and hard to find from a physician who is accepting and affirming. And so it’s always been a goal of mine to provide that, because I have I have always sought those things.
And even still as a practicing physician, it’s hard for me sometimes to find physicians who won’t cringe at hearing that I have a wife or who will be accepting of the fact that I do participate in different areas of social justice movements.

[30:02] And because I feel like somebody should be open with their doctor about the types of things that interest them and bring them joy, because those are things that will help our mental health a lot of the times when we look at mind, body, and spirit as a collective whole person.
And there was never any particular moment in my life where there was a light switch of, aha, I’m going to do this and I wanna be out there and put my voice and name out there.
I think it’s just the more that I learned. And I was so fortunate to have access to these different opportunities to learn,
whether it’s through my AP courses in high school that women’s studies course in high school that so many people that I’ve talked to always say wait you had women’s studies in high school I didn’t know that that was abnormal until I talked to people about it but just,
having access to all these different forms of education.

[30:54] And always jumping in and saying yes to learning about something, and especially about something that has never been presented to me throughout my life growing up, that has been really eye-opening and helped me learn about the world in which I live.
And I just always wanted to make it a better place. And having, again, the opportunity to become a physician because I’ve had the resources, because I’ve not had the systemic oppression way down on me and hold me back from being a physician,
I feel like also it’s partly my duty to use my privilege and my positions to be able to provide this care and to use my voice to raise the voice of others, to stand by others to get.

[31:38] Their voices heard. And I think that’s really what’s going to improve our communities and this blue marble that we live on together.
Dr. Craig Lovell You know, obviously, I don’t have to explain to you that making the decision to to get behind some issues that might not be readily accepted by a huge portion of the population can be challenging.
It can expose you to any number of obstacles. It can expose you to considerable hate, for lack of a better word.
And if you can, I would really like to hear you talk about how that has affected you and and how you have managed to persist in the face of that kind of challenge.
Absolutely. Even to this day, I still face the challenges of providing the care that I do. I provide gender-affirming care for transgender patients in Florida, and I provide abortion care.
Honestly, even providing medication-assisted therapy with like Suboxone for substance use disorder. Things that the world views in a very politicized manner is going to be
very hard to continue practicing in medicine and I have faced you know some barriers before, whether it was.

[32:54] From colleagues or from organizations or anything like that. Right?
I have faced those things. But I think the thing that keeps me going is that so deeply in my heart, I know that I’m doing the right thing.
I know that I’m providing the care that people otherwise might not get and therefore might lead to really great significant negative outcomes for their health, whether that’s just their health declining or death in general, right?
Like if I can save or help improve somebody’s life, then I will do that.

[33:31] And it might come at the expense of mean comments to me or some people not liking me. And that’s okay.
Not everybody’s going to like me, right? Even if I wasn’t doing these things, not everybody would like me anyways. And I’m okay with that. I’m not here to be everybody’s friend.
I’m here to make sure people feel comfortable, whether they have different political views in me and they, you know, in medicine, I need them to feel comfortable. I need them to trust me that I’m providing them with the best evidence-based medicine and that we’re going to do it from a perspective where they feel comfortable, where they feel in charge of their healthcare,
and where they can practice their own autonomy, their own bodily autonomy. The things that we, you know, we read in our oath as we become physicians, those are the things I want, I try to uphold. And so yes, while I get those other negative things coming in, seeing my patients who get that type of care.
Or who cry in your exam room because they’ve never had a physician listen to them because their body size, because of their body habitus, and they’ve always been told the same few talking points, or because they practice a different religion.
To have somebody actually feel heard and comfortable in medicine, and then take your advice for medicine and truly improve their health and their lives, that means the world.
So I will take those negative comments from people or sideways glances if I have improved the lives of even a handful of people at the end of the day.

[34:58] Well Dr. Kelly Tibbitt, you are an unusually brave person and I’m very impressed with your ability to continue to do what you do with determination and with grace.
It’s really quite an example for others, I think.
I’ve really enjoyed this conversation, but what I want to do at this point is step out of your way for a moment. And we’re going to do what we came here to do. And Dr. Kelly Tibbitt will give us her personal prescriptions for success.
Thanks, Randy. Yeah, so from someone who has many interests and things, after all, I am a family doctor with a deep passion for social justice.
I’ve often overextended myself in doing so.

[35:44] I’ve learned a lot of lessons. So hopefully some of these prescriptions will be useful for listeners out there.
The very first thing would be find what brings you joy and keep doing it.
It doesn’t matter what it is. If it’s playing an instrument, if it’s being involved in organized medicine or health policy, if it’s dancing or yoga or exercise, horseback riding, Do it and keep doing it.
At the end of the day, if you’re in medicine and you’re a physician, and even if it may have been your calling and this is your lifelong dream, At the end of it.
You know, medicine is still a career. It still is a way that we make money and yes, we’re passionate about it and we love our patients. But you also need to do the things that bring you
joy. Even when things get hard in medicine and in going through training, honestly, even in just the day to day as a practicing doc too. Something else that I’d like to for folks to know is to say yes
to opportunities, even if they scare you. But also, feel free to say no. You don’t always have to say yes, especially if you don’t have the bandwidth to do something, or if it doesn’t interest you.

[36:54] You know, just because you say no doesn’t mean that people are not going to consider you for positions or for involvement again. You just don’t have the time to do that right now, because we know that when people take on a task, we want to do it right. And especially us as physicians,
we want to do it right. And we want to make sure that everything goes right on cue. And if you don’t don’t have the bandwidth to do that, just be upfront about it. It’s okay to ask for help, whether that’s professionally or personally. There’s all this stigma.

[37:25] Around asking for help in medicine and people perceiving that as being a weakness. But in my opinion, it takes a lot of strength for somebody to ask for help because you’re going against the grain here, against the mold.
And I want you to be confident in asking for that help and knowing that you deserve it. You’re human too. And lastly, I would say apply to that job or that leadership position.

[37:50] Even if you feel that imposter syndrome that we all always feel in medicine, just apply. Don’t let yourself tell you no. Let that be the job of the selection committee to tell you no. If they truly
don’t think you’ll be the fit or qualified, just don’t be your own saboteur. If you’re meant to be there, you’ll be there. Just apply and let things happen. Those are my few prescriptions for success
and I hope that they’re helpful for those of you listening. Well, they certainly reflect everything that I’ve learned about you up to this point, Kelly. And I really appreciate you sharing that wisdom with us. Before we go, I want to give you an opportunity to tell our audience where they can,
find you and find out more about what you do. Absolutely. Yeah. So I am on Twitter if you want reach me. My handle is at KTOTUS and also you can find me through the AMSA Foundation and so
through the AMSA.org website and if you’re going to be in Arizona in the next few months we’ll be having our annual national convention and I’d love to meet up with you in person.
Well Dr. Kelly Tibbert, it really has been a pleasure speaking with you today. I thank you so much for taking the time to be with us. I’ve really enjoyed it.
Thank you so much for the opportunity. This was such a great time.

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