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A Saturday training that changes how you practice on Monday is rare, and that’s exactly what FOCUS GI is designed to do. We recorded live from the event with Dr. Anish Patel, the nonprofit founder behind FOCUS GI, plus Dr. Richa Shukla (course director) and Dr. Kevin Pak (hepatologist) to talk about what happens when medical education is built for real clinic decisions, not ego or noise.

We get into why the program started in Central Texas, how it grew from a small local idea into a hybrid event serving GI fellows and advanced practice providers across states and even countries, and what “clinically oriented” really means in practice. You’ll hear how the team chooses speakers, updates topics, and protects hands-on learning, especially for first-year GI fellows facing a steep learning curve and nonstop consult questions. We also unpack how the APP and fellow track serves different needs while strengthening the same GI care team.

Then we go deeper into the human side of IBD care: hope and trust. Dr. Patel explains why “hope” is the point of provider education, while “trust” is the skill that makes treatment partnerships work, especially when patients have normalized symptoms for years. We also tackle misinformation head-on, including the growing role of social media influencers in shaping IBD myths. Along the way, Dr. Pak shares why accurate FibroScan interpretation matters and how misreads can send patients down the wrong clinical pathway, and Dr. Shukla reflects on patient education around medication risks and how to talk about scary side-effect lists with real numbers and context.

Subscribe for more live conversations from FOCUS GI, and if this helped you, please share it with a colleague or friend and leave a review so more patients and providers can find it.

Links: 

• FOCUS GI website
• Dr. Richa Shukla
• FOCUS GI's Facebook page

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