Beyond the clinical excellence she provides her patients, Susan S. Khalil, MD, Assistant Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Science at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, says she wanted to learn how to communicate in a better way with health care leaders, and to have the tools that are needed to advance advocacy and help reduce barriers to care.
In the following Q&A, Dr. Khalil explains how she is already using her new skills.
What do you do in your current position?
I’m a gynecologic surgeon with a clinical focus on endometriosis and pelvic pain, as well as minimally invasive gynecologic surgery and robotic surgery. During my master’s program, I was promoted to Program Director for the Fellowship in Minimally Invasive Gynecologic Surgery for The Mount Sinai Hospital, which helps hone the skills of gynecologic surgeons for minimal access as well as improved surgical outcomes for women.
You’ve been a practicing surgeon for 10 years. Why a master’s degree?
I thought a master’s degree would help me develop leadership skills. The program has taught me to think in different ways, to think not just about clinical outcomes but also about health care on a population level and about ways to innovate change in health care.
It has also helped me better understand how the various systems of health care intersect. I really enjoyed the strategy, policy, and economics classes I took, and I learned to apply these concepts to gynecology and gynecologic surgery. One of the most important things I learned is how to communicate more effectively in order to deliver the best level of services to our patients.
The master’s program also introduced me to a group of mentors who have helped support my quality improvement initiatives in surgical infections in obstetrics and gynecology, and in furthering innovation in endometriosis care.
What, specifically, did you learn?
The program is set up in different team-led educational experiences, so it helps us see how other clinicians view medicine and health care—and how physicians and administrators can better understand each other’s perspectives and communicate more effectively. We all communicate in different silos, so this training helped to bridge that gap, teaching us how to use language that resonates with administrators as we communicate what we need for our patients, for our hospital divisions, and for the overall health care system to function effectively.
As an example, I was working with a teaching assistant from one of my classes to pitch a research idea for using artificial intelligence for my patients with endometriosis and chronic pain. I had submitted research proposals over the years and they never got much traction, but now we just won a pitch challenge and were awarded $25,000 to support my research. It’s such a big win for an underserved disease process and it’s very exciting. I attribute it to the training I got in this program, and learning how to work with other team members in health care to advance improvements for the issues we see daily, one on one, with our patients.
What are your next career goals?
I would like to take on more of a leadership position at Mount Sinai to help advance gynecology and women’s health care in general, and to have a seat at the table to help support an infrastructure that provides better health care for everyone.