Action Collaborative on Combatting Substance Use and Opioid Crises Members

Learning A Lot About A Lot
The path Dr. Humayun “Hank” Chaudhry took to become president and CEO of the Federation of State Medical Boards (FSMB) was far from conventional. He never saw himself in a health executive role- he simply wanted to work directly with patients in clinical settings. This was reflected in his choice to pursue primary care. Dr. Chaudhry chose to train in internal medicine so he could address a wide range of patient needs and “learn a lot about a lot”. He wanted to help as many patients as possible and not limit his care by focusing on a single organ. After graduating from New York Institute of Technology’s College of Osteopathic Medicine, Dr. Chaudhry served as a reservist for 14 years in the United States Air Force where he became a flight surgeon. During those formative years of his military career Dr. Chaudhry learned to balance his work and family life while serving the nation. It was during his time in the Air Force that he expanded his role as an educator and learned to function in an ultra-structured environment.

Dr. Chaudhry was first exposed to the administrative side of medicine when he became the director of medical education and a designated institutional official (DIO) at Long Beach Medical Center, New York. During his experience as DIO, he was responsible for assuring training compliance with the American Ostopathic Association institutional, common, and specialty-specific program requirements, as well as additional professional, educational, accreditation, and regulatory standards. After being responsible for leading medical students and residents through their medical training, Dr. Chaudhry decided to formally learn more about the science of leadership.

Learning to Lead
Dr. Chaudhry earned a Master’s degree in health management at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in 2001. During his studies, he learned about various leadership styles and began to understand how health policy, administration, and organizational management intersect and can directly improve population health.

When he saw an opportunity to care for the health care needs of 1.5 million people Dr. Chaudhry recognized those familiar intersecting forces and chose to alter his entire career trajectory. In 2007, Dr. Chaudhry became Health Commissioner of Suffolk County in New York. As a clinician, he’d seen patients one at a time. Now he was responsible for overseeing the health and well-being of the county’s entire population and a $400 million budget. Just two years into his tenure as Commissioner, Dr. Chaudhry was presented with a challenge few health departments and officials ever want to face – the pandemic H1N1 influenza outbreak.

During the H1N1 outbreak, Dr. Chaudhry learned about the importance of messaging and communication, and of staying calm, being nimble, and being able to bring together the right people. These strengths would stay with him and carry him through the rest of his career. Dr. Chaudhry said the pandemic helped him learn that “there’s always time to bring together the right people, think through the issues, and develop a plan of action.” The approaches he took as Commissioner are the same ones he’s using in his role today at the FSMB, which includes addressing the opioid epidemic.

A New Focus for FSMB
Founded in 1912, the FSMB’s primary responsibility has always been supporting America’s state and territorial medical boards as they protect the public through licensing, discipline, and regulation of physicians and other health professionals. In 1992, the FSMB became a co-sponsor of the United States Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE). For more than a decade, the opioid epidemic has prompted FSMB to do more to raise awareness among medical student, residents, and practicing clinicians about responsible opioid prescribing.

Through continuing medical education, a new focus for FSMB, it helps member boards ensure that as standards of care change and new medical evidence becomes available, practicing clinicians learn how to apply that understanding. By working with such federal agencies as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the FSMB has issued policies and recommendations about opioid prescribing to enable state medical boards to improve the quality of health care.

The USMLE is used to assess a physician’s readiness for practice and to apply, concepts, and principles, and to advance patient-centered care skills. As a co-sponsor of the USMLE, the FSMB is able to influence how future clinicians are being educated and trained. In recent years, that has included promoting the assessment of knowledge and skills about pain management, addiction and opioid and other substance use disorders.

Joining the Opioid Action Collaborative
Each time Dr. Chaudhry visits with members boards, they share with him their ongoing concerns about the opioid epidemic. They describe the heartbreaking stories of patients or their loved ones who have died from an opioid overdose or misuse and the licensed physicians who either did not perceive a problem until it was too late or, worse, were complicit in the outcomes. Because medical regulation is complaint-based, a big challenge for member boards is not hearing from patients and their loved ones until the situation is too late. Members of the medical profession, Dr. Chaudhry notes, also have a duty to report problems they may see in health care.

The tragic stories Dr. Chaudhry hears about and the interests of state medical boards align with the solutions and issues being addressed by the National Academy of Medicine Action Collaborative on Countering the U.S. Opioid Epidemic. For Dr. Chaudhry, that meant it was a “no brainer” to join the steering committee and help make a difference. He wants to help assure the alignment of goals across the four working groups of the Opioid Action Collaborative and ensure implementable solutions are being prioritized.

Dr. Chaudhry sees the Action Collaborative as different from other efforts he has been involved with because of its emphasis on action. “A lot of organizations put together guidelines and recommendations that may or may not be read or acted upon. This group has expressed a desire to measure the outcomes of the recommendations we make.”

From the beginning of his career, Dr. Chaudhry has wanted to learn “a lot about a lot” and over the course of his career he has expanded his knowledge base to encompass leadership, medical education, health administration, and public health. It is this motivation that leads him to learn more from the clinicians and patients he talks with to help develop solutions to address their needs, to serve on the NAM Opioid Action Collaborative steering committee, and to continue to care for as many people as possible.