C.S. Tse, MD (co-host)
Walk us through your current GI role and your path to getting there:
Dr. Chung Sang Tse
I grew up in Toronto and moved to the United States for medical school at the Yale University, New Haven, Conn., and internal medicine residency at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. During my residency, I became interested in gastroenterology with a particular interest in inflammatory bowel disease after studying the postoperative outcomes of IBD patients on biologics and examining the clinical course of IBD patients with coexistent celiac disease. I am a third-year gastroenterology fellow at Brown University. I will spend a year as the advanced IBD fellow at the University of California–San Diego from July 2021 to June 2022. My current research examines IBD patients’ quality of care and the psychosocial impacts on patients’ disease course. I am working with the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation’s IBD Qorus Learning Health System to improve the quality of care and outcomes of patients with IBD.
What is your favorite part about your current role? Least favorite part?
My favorite part of my current role is to combine patient care with clinical research, particularly for patients with IBD. My least favorite part is encountering “red tape” that may give a false sense of productivity but not actually be beneficial for patient care. Some of this is discussed in this article from the Harvard Business Review.
What are your interests outside of work?
I serve as the National President of the American Medical Women’s Association (AMWA) Residents & Fellows Division. I am a Core Faculty member of the AMWA IGNITE MD program, which is a nation-wide initiative to educate and empower female medical trainees. I currently serve as an abstract reviewer for Digestive Diseases Week® (since 2018). I previously served as an abstract reviewer and judge for the American Medical Association’s Scientific Symposium (2019 & 2020). Outside of work, I enjoy hiking, traveling, and reading.
What advice would you give to someone who matches into GI on Dec. 2:
Identify mentors early. (You can have more than one!) Try to imagine where you want your career to be in 5 years – generalist vs. specialist. Will you have a niche in practice? Is advanced endoscopy (ERCP, EUS, etc.) going to be a part of your practice? Academic, private practice, community practice, or hybrid? Knowing your goals will help tailor the GI fellowship experience to get you to where you want to be in your career. GI fellowship may be like a buffet table where there are many opportunities and options, but one can rarely do it all! Choosing and pursuing experiences that ultimately align with your goals can help you make the most out of your time during GI fellowship training.
How do you see the future of GI changing as a new generation of trainees enters the workforce?
I think that there will be more integration of information technology and artificial intelligence into GI, just as for the rest of society. For example, we can see this clearly illustrated in the rapid uptake of telemedicine (including GI) during COVID-19.
Why did you want to host this podcast?
I am intrigued by the opportunity to connect with GIs broadly through this AGA podcast. It is a portable way to use on-demand technology to engage in conversations relevant to other early GIs who may not be conventionally addressed by other means, such as journal articles, conferences, traditional didactics, and books.
What’s your favorite episode so far?
Janice Jou’s podcast was phenomenal in providing mentorship advice (at a distance) to trainees who are interested in an academic career in clinical medicine.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve gotten that’s helped you in your career so far?
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act, but a habit.” This advice is most commonly credited to Aristotle.
Be sure to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts or listen on the AGA website: https://gastro.org/podcast.
Dr. Whitson is GI fellowship director, Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra-Northwell, Great Neck, N.Y. @MJWhitsonMD. Dr. Nandy is a gastroenterologist at Presbyterian Medical Group, Albuquerque, N.M. @NinaNandyMD. Dr. Tse is a GI fellow at Brown University, Providence, R.I. @CSTseMD.
