Blogs

AAIM Member Spotlight

Avital O'Glasser, MD

Associate Professor of Medicine 
Assistant Program Director (Social Media, Scholarship) 
Oregon Health & Science University

How long have you been a member of AAIM?

I’ve been a member for just over a year after I formally joined the Oregon Health & Science University internal medicine residency program leadership team. At this point, I have not had a chance to attend a conference. I’ve seen others go and have been intrigued. I am looking forward to attending one in the future.

Describe your typical day.

My day begins early at home with a flurry of activity to get my two young kids out the door to their respective schools. We also have a new puppy so I take her for a 15 to 20-minute walk in the morning before anyone else is out of bed, which is good “me” time.

I spend the bulk of clinical time in the Pre-Operative Medicine Clinic, which involves being a hospitalist in an outpatient setting without practicing primary care. I do pre-op consultations on a wide variety of patients having a wide variety of surgeries and help supervise a core of group of nurse practitioners in the clinic. I spend the remainder of my clinical time attending on inpatient medicine wards with the residents.

When I’m not seeing patients, I wear a smattering of other hats. I’m an assistant program director of our residency program. I also do a lot of work behind scenes on scholarship and manage social media accounts for the residency program. I can be followed on Twitter at @aoglasser, and the residency program is account is @OHSUIMRes.

What is your favorite part of the job?

My favorite part of my job is the ability to make connections--that makes me tick. The day I am more resilient is the day I have had meaningful connections. Also, what I do with pre-op medicine forces me out of the internal medicine comfort zone and provides me with the opportunity to work with surgeons and anesthesiologist who I otherwise wouldn’t know.

Social media for physicians also intrigues me as it fosters connections with people who share a common interest.

How has the AAIM membership been of value to you and your career?

It’s a means for different types of learning and connections. I’m a member of several professional societies, but this affiliation engages the med-ed side of the work I do. The motivation to be part of this community compelled me to submit a poster last year. I submitted a workshop abstract with a collaborator who I met on Twitter and we were able to come together to share our experiences 

What's your favorite moment of your career so far?

I have a very memorable experience with one particular elderly patient in pre-op clinic. I discovered he was a Holocaust survivor. His past surgical history tab was blank in the EHR. Asking him about any past surgeries began a conversation about how he survived a major injury in a concentration camp. He had been hit by artillery fire and had makeshift surgery without anesthesia in the camp and survived.

What was your childhood dream job?

I wanted to be paleontologist. I was the two year old who read the book about dinosaurs and got hooked. It was my foray into sciences, and I started college on this career pathway. As I matured and had the right mentorship, I realized my place in sciences was not poring over rocks, and that the human connection was missing from that. I briefly considered a career in forensic anthropology or pathology since I loved studying anatomy and bones, but I ultimately realized that I wanted to work with living people. 

How do you spend your free time?

I have two kids, six years old and four years old, and a new puppy. I like knitting to keep my hands busy, as well as cooking, gardening, and genealogy research. 

What’s one thing people would be surprised to know about you? 

I come from a family of educators. My mom has been in early child development since I was a baby--I was part of her master’s thesis when I was a toddler. My younger sister went into special education and teaches 3^rd grade. I didn’t see myself as a classroom-based teacher when I was younger, but they’ve both been my inspiration as I’ve found my niche in the realm of graduate medical education.