Shadow Me Next!

20 - Clinical Research Transforms Healthcare While Putting Patients First | Leigh Schirmer, DMSc, PA-C

• Ashley Love • Season 1 • Episode 20

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Step into the mysterious world of clinical research with Leigh Shermer, a Physician Assistant and Doctor of Medical Science who's breaking barriers in an area traditionally dominated by physicians. With over 18 years of healthcare experience across cardiology, critical care, and cardiothoracic surgery, Leigh now leads clinical trials that develop the medical treatments of tomorrow.

What exactly happens during a clinical trial? Leigh pulls back the curtain on this fascinating process, walking us through the careful protocols, patient safety measures, and day-to-day operations of a clinical research site that might be running 40 different studies simultaneously. Far from the stereotype of researchers working in isolated labs, she describes hands-on patient interactions, thorough safety monitoring, and the delicate balance of following strict scientific protocols while providing compassionate care.

Perhaps most compelling is Leigh's insight into why patients choose to participate in clinical research. Some join from altruism, wanting to advance medical knowledge. Others seek access to treatments for conditions they couldn't otherwise afford. And yes, some participate for financial compensation – a practical acknowledgment of the time commitment these studies require. In all cases, Leigh emphasizes that patient safety remains the absolute priority, dismantling the misconception that participants are treated as "guinea pigs."

Leigh's career journey itself tells a powerful story about the evolving healthcare landscape. Her transition from cardiothoracic surgery to critical care to cardiology and finally to clinical research demonstrates the remarkable versatility of PA careers. Interestingly, it was the COVID-19 pandemic and her curiosity about vaccine development that sparked her interest in clinical research, eventually leading her to earn her doctorate and pioneer new roles for PAs as principal investigators.

Subscribe to Shadow Me Next for more fascinating conversations that take you behind the scenes of healthcare careers you might never have considered!

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Ashley:

Hello and welcome to Shadow Me Next, a podcast where I take you into and behind the scenes of the medical world to provide you with a deeper understanding of the human side of medicine. I'm Ashley, a physician assistant, medical editor, clinical preceptor and the creator of Shadow Me Next. It is my pleasure to introduce you to incredible members of the healthcare field and uncover their unique stories, the joys and challenges they face and what drives them in their careers. It's access you want and stories you need, whether you're a pre-health student or simply curious about the healthcare field. I invite you to join me as we take a conversational and personal look into the lives and minds of leaders in medicine. I don't want you to miss a single one of these conversations, so make sure that you subscribe to this podcast, which will automatically notify you when new episodes are dropped, and follow us on Instagram and Facebook at Shadow Me Next, where we will review highlights from this conversation and where I'll give you sneak previews of our upcoming guests. I'm thrilled to introduce today's guest, lee Shermer, a physician assistant and doctor of medical science, who is also a trailblazer in the world of clinical research and a true advocate for PAs and roles you might not expect.

Ashley:

With over 18 years of experience in healthcare. Lee has worked across cardiology, critical care and cardiothoracic surgery, but it's her current role as a principal investigator and sub-investigator in clinical research that sets her apart. Lee's journey into clinical research was sparked by her curiosity during the pandemic, especially around the rapid development of vaccines. Now she's leading trials in diverse fields, from psychiatric studies to cardiac research, ensuring patient safety and pushing the boundaries of medical advancements. She shares how being a PA in clinical research is anything but behind the scenes work. It's hands-on, patient-focused and absolutely vital to the development of new therapeutics and devices. Focused and absolutely vital to the development of new therapeutics and devices. In this episode, leigh takes us behind the curtain of clinical trials, explaining the difference between principal investigators and sub-investigators, how patients are selected and sometimes rejected from clinical trials, the importance of safety in clinical research and how she's helping to reshape the role of PAs in this growing field. If you have ever wondered about the cutting edge of medicine and the real impact of clinical research, this is an episode you won't want to miss. Please keep in mind that the content of this podcast is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only and should not be considered as professional medical advice. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer or company.

Ashley:

This is Shadow Me Next with Leigh Shermer. Leigh, thank you so much for joining us on shadow me next today. I am thrilled that you are here and you have a very unique role in medicine, and so the fact that we are talking about this is just something of my dreams. So thank you so much for being here and joining us. Yes, thank you so much for having me, ashley. So, lee, tell me, tell me what your title is, and then tell me what you do on the day-to-day when you come to work. You are a PA, but your life looks very different than my life.

Leigh :

Yes, so I work in clinical research. I am an investigator, generally a sub-investigator, but I have been on some studies where I'm the principal investigator, which I'm sure we'll get into in a little bit. But basically clinical research is a field of medicine where we do the beginning stages of research so that we can help take care of people. And you know, in clinical medicine we're used to prescribing medications after we make diagnoses and things like that, and this is like the beginning work and we, you know, are sort of behind the scenes in a different area of medicine where we are doing trials for different therapies, whether it be vaccines or therapeutics, so your typical medications that might be prescribed antihypertensives or therapeutics. So your typical medications that might be prescribed antihypertensives, statin medications and all sorts of fun other things you know, like the weight loss medications, which are really a hot thing right now.

Ashley:

That's fantastic. So, investigator, tell us more about this. You mentioned two different types. What are the roles that both of those play? Keep in mind that there's more interview prep, such as mock interviews and personal statement review, over on shadowmenextcom. There you'll find amazing resources to help you as you prepare to answer your own quality questions. Now, lee and I did not discuss a quality question, but from our conversation, there was one topic that would make a fantastic interview question how does clinical research improve healthcare and what role do PAs play in advancing these improvements? This is going to be what we start to see in the future, and being able to answer this question during an interview will set you apart from many of the other applicants.

Leigh :

Yeah, so an investigator is like a medical practitioner of some sort who is seeing patients and determining their eligibility and safety during trials at the beginning, before they even get into a trial per se. Generally the role of a principal investigator has been that of a medical doctor or a PhD or a dentist, for example. There are certainly others as well, but it's generally been a medical doctor, when you talk about clinical research, for many of the trials that we do, and they are basically in charge of, responsible for the conduct of the trial, and everyone that participates in the trial from a site standpoint or from the research site standpoint is under that principal investigator's sort of delegation. So they're delegated by the principal investigator to participate in the trial because they have the qualifications to do so. The sub-investigator role, which is generally something that is more suited to PAs, nps, but certainly also physicians and others, can be also delegated to the sub-investigator role.

Leigh :

It's generally somebody with some sort of medical degree can basically do all the same things that the principal investigator would do, but they're delegated under the principal investigator to do those things because they have the medical qualifications to do so. So they would still do, you know, taking history and physicals, ensuring that patients meet the criteria to be in the trial, they're safe to be in the trial and all those type of things. So it's exciting. There's a lot to the role, the investigator role. I certainly didn't know anything about it until I started to research, you know, getting into clinical research you know, getting into clinical research.

Ashley:

It is fascinating to me, and here I am thinking in clinical research you're just you're sitting behind a desk all day and you know running, running tests and and messing with computers and equipment, and it turns out there's there's an entire clinical side to this, right. I mean, it is still direct patient care, from what it sounds like.

Leigh :

Yes, yes. So the nice thing about clinical research is it's not your typical kind of chemistry behind the bench doing laboratory studies. This is a whole different field, but this remains clinical, so that's the piece of it that I really love. So, generally, these are either I work at the site level, so I work at a standalone clinical research site Actually, we're part of a network now, which is cool, but I work at a standalone site and other sites might be under. You know a university and that you have different departments within the university that run their own research, but I actually work at a clinical research site. It's been around for about 30 years.

Leigh :

We do all sorts of different research as I mentioned vaccines and therapeutics but I get to see patients every day, which is really great. So we see patients. When they come to us and they want to get in a trial, we determine their eligibility to do so and then see them throughout the trial at different visits as needed, and basically everything is off of a protocol that has been sent to us or has been created by certain sponsors, and when we say sponsors, those are generally pharmaceutical companies or device companies that make up protocols and we are in charge of following them to a T. So it's nice we see all sorts of different things. The protocols are varied, especially in you know how complicated they are, but it certainly gets me thinking. Every day and no two days are the same the type of patients that I see run the gamut between psychiatric style, different studies, cardiac studies, gi studies, neuro studies. So it's really I see see a lot.

Ashley:

Now is that. Would that all be like in the span of one day? Do you have different patients coming in for different clinical studies throughout the entire day, or do you have like Monday is your psychiatric study and Tuesday is your cardiovascular study, and so on and so forth?

Leigh :

Yes, so at our site we have about 40 active studies right now, so it's a lot. We are very busy, yeah, and most days are mixed in, so you have patients coming in from all the different studies, which is really pretty neat. The only time that we would generally have a full day of the same patient would be if we have, like, if we're enrolling a high, high volume vaccine study or something, and then you would see patients for the same study all day. That's just the way we. We would do it. We call it like a bulk day where we would just see the same, just to make it easier. So the staff you know sort of know what we're doing and kind of go from there. But most days are very varied, are varied, and so that works out well and keeps things fresh.

Ashley:

How do you keep all that straight? I mean, I'm just sitting here thinking, you know it's. It's hard enough for me to see patients that that are not involved in a clinical trial. There is no, there is no procedure truly that I have to follow. That's being dictated by a sponsor, like you just mentioned. Um and I, I know what care they're receiving because, generally speaking, most of them are very stable. But but for you, I would imagine, oh, I would imagine, there is a substantial amount of chart review that goes into this, perhaps, and then and then maybe figuring out where that patient is. But what does that be like for one patient visit? What is how much work is that for you?

Leigh :

Yeah, so a lot goes into it. So before we start a trial we receive the protocol and as investigators it's our job to and generally where I work, it's the sub-investigator that reviews the protocol and is charged with understanding it well, so then we can then create a sort of a template for the recruiters, for the recruiting team to go and find the correct patients. So from the start, generally I know the protocol, you know pretty well. We'll teach the recruiters and then patients, you know, start to come in. I will say that I know the protocol. You know by heart at first when I'm, you know, learning about it and going through it and teaching the recruiters. But oftentimes, before it gets started, it can be, you know, several weeks to months. So generally I'll have to, you know, refresh my memory when we actually start the study.

Leigh :

And the good news is that it's very easy to pull up the protocol as needed to review and, you know, look at things closely to ensure that we're following it to a T and, you know, always reviewing the inclusion and exclusion criteria. If there are certain lab values that are exclusionary for patients or if it meets the stopping criteria, it's called for, you know, getting off of a study drug, so there's a lot to it, fortunately. So there's a lot to it, fortunately. Protocols are, you know, easily accessible and I'm constantly going back and forth to them because obviously, with 40 studies going on, there's no way to remember all the things all the time.

Leigh :

But I've gotten very good at control f and I can find whatever I need in the protocol very quickly, because they're all similar and once you get used to reading protocols, you know what you're looking for pretty quick.

Ashley:

That is so neat and I'm so glad you mentioned the sub-investigator role again, because I did want to get back to that, lee. It sounds like, as a PA in this field, being a principal investigator kind of in charge and responsible for the conduct of the trials, like you mentioned, it sounds like this is obviously this is a really prestigious position in the trial. Is this common for well, number one, is this common to see PAs in clinical trial and clinical research period? And number two do you see a lot of PAs as principal investigators? Dr Anneke Vandenbroek.

Leigh :

Yeah. So this is something that I was somewhat interested in getting into, becoming a principal investigator. When I first started looking into clinical research it was hard to find information on PAs as PIs Kids were getting older teenage, young teenage years and I thought, if I was going to do it, I wanted to do it soon, because I just didn't know how long that feeling was going to last. But I wanted to go back and further my education and honestly, I have college coming soon for my girls. Also, financially, it was something that I needed to do now. So I went back to get my doctorate because I felt that would give me a better chance to earn some study awards as a principal investigator.

Leigh :

I think there definitely are PAs that are PIs. We are few and far between, but I think it will be happening more, especially if we push for it. I think we are certainly able. We are well-educated and we meet the criteria to be PAs Certain studies certainly more so than others. There are studies that no doubt would need specialists and we would not likely be qualified for, but I would say that a lot of the studies that we do at our site can be done very well by PAs.

Leigh :

So I've been advocating to get into that role a bit more, and the studies that I've started off on being a principal investigator are more like device studies, so things that are like a one-time blood draw study and also questionnaire studies, so when we try to find out more about patients' experiences with different things of having a disease. So you know, those kinds of questionnaire studies are typically on the easier side and can be done by a PI easily. So it's nice to get my feet wet and I hope to continue to push to get awarded more trials as a PI, to get awarded more trials as a PI, and I'm very fortunate that the research network that I work for have supported me fully and the two full-time physicians that I work with are extremely supportive as well, which is wonderful.

Ashley:

It's great. It's great to have support and thank you for trailblazing this for PAs and other non-physician clinicians PAs, nps, et cetera. Can we talk a little bit about a day in your life? So so we've touched on this a little bit. Right, you have a lot of patients typically coming in on a number of different trials. What does it look like for you? Are you at a computer most of the day? Are you face-to-face with patients? Are you communicating with a whole bunch of other people of the day? Are you face-to-face with patients? Are you communicating with a whole bunch of other people throughout the day? What does your day today a day in your life, if you will? What does that look like?

Leigh :

Yeah, so my day usually starts off with reviewing labs labs that came back in the previous couple of days for patients in either that are currently in a trial or who have been screening and are wanting to be in the trial. So these screening labs are really important because they may have exclusionary items within the labs if they're abnormal. So I tend to do those first. I like to get those done so I can pass them on to our team so they can see and make a plan for patients. And then during the day I will be seeing patient visits throughout the morning. Throughout the morning for the most part, and it depends on what the protocol calls for, so they don't always need an investigator to see the patient. If it's just a follow-up and there haven't been any adverse events or any concerns, then oftentimes a physical isn't even required. So a lot of our study visits are performed only by the study coordinator and the study coordinator is the one who goes in and takes care of the visit. They document things, they take the vitals and that type of thing. So there the study coordinators do quite a bit, and even with screening the study coordinators will take care of the informed consent and things like that. So they're very involved in the trial. But if there are any medical questions that come up, if patients have questions about the study or the investigational product, the investigators are the ones that would handle those questions if it wasn't a question that the study coordinator felt comfortable doing or that kind of thing.

Leigh :

And then I've gotten more involved in clinical operations at our site. We've had some staffing changes in the last year and so it's necessitated that, but also I think it makes me a better investigator to understand all the site operations and how we can become a sort of more efficient site, provide really good quality data to our sponsors. So I've gotten more involved in processes in the lab and how just how the lab is functioning, are we being efficient, are we doing things to the best of our ability, and things like that. So a lot of my time in the morning is just spent bopping around to different departments just to see if anybody needs anything, how I can help. There are always things that are needing to be done, so trying to help facilitate communication between departments. And we have wonderful teams within the office. We also have research assistants who do lots of things, but they get the charts and the lab kits prepped and things like that and follow up lab results and do all sorts of stuff, just always trying to be someone who can help the other teams if needed. Because it's much.

Leigh :

Clinical research, at least at the site level, is much different than a clinic, because things are not the same every day. It's just not like you see, your you know schedule of patients, however many that may be. Maybe you have to send one to the emergency department every couple weeks or depending on what field you're in, but here things are just constantly changing it's. You can have a trial that's supposed to start tomorrow but it doesn't start till next week, or they started early. You got the green light to start it sooner. So things are. There's constantly moving pieces that need to be followed up on.

Ashley:

It's probably so exciting so exciting to walk into work every day and know, generally speaking, what to expect, because you know your roles, but, at the same time, also surprises, and probably exciting surprises when it comes to things like clinical trials and the development of new therapeutics and implementation of new devices, cutting edge of medicine. That's what you're waking up to every single day, which is really neat.

Leigh :

Yeah, it really is, and sometimes I really do have to stand back and try to regain that perspective because we really are doing amazing things. When you're seeing patients through the different studies, it doesn't necessarily always feel like it's like this could be the next best thing, because you're just going from the day to day to day, but then once the study is completed and sometimes they're years long studies, so it's not like it happens in a month when the study is completed you can go wow, like we just put a lot of patients through this study, hopefully study wide between all the sites, that they were able, the sponsor was able to gain enough good information and that they can move forward with a product that can affect many in a really great way.

Ashley:

I'm thinking about all of the advances that we've seen in our lifetime and it's just incredible the amount of hard work that has gone into so many of these therapeutics and devices. So thank you for doing that hard work. I want to talk about the patients a little bit, and it's a two-part idea. You mentioned that the recruiter usually finds the patients that might be eligible for this trial. To your knowledge, what are the challenges when you're trying to recruit these patients for a clinical trial?

Leigh :

Oh yeah, there's a lot of challenges with recruiting. So we have wonderful recruiters. We have been around for about 30 years certainly not with me there. I've been at this site for just over two years, but it's been about 30 years.

Leigh :

So we have quite a database of patients with lots of different diagnoses, which is helpful when it comes to recruitment for different studies.

Leigh :

For example, if we have a migraine study, we can just go right to that patient base and oftentimes we're given a recruitment allotment, a marketing budget, to recruit for different studies, and you'd think that might be enough, but unfortunately sometimes it's not and recruitment can be a real problem, especially for protocols that are very specific. So, for example, you may have a protocol that wants somebody with this is just me throwing it out there but they might want somebody with established cardiovascular disease, diabetes and hypertension or whatever, and it can be very, it can be difficult. It can be like trying to find a needle in a haystack sometimes these patients. And then does the patient want to be in the trial? Are they on exclusionary medications? Do they have other diagnoses that prohibit them from being a candidate for being in the trial? So it can be a challenge. We certainly get a lot of people that are interested, but finding people that meet all the different criteria can be a real challenge in some studies.

Ashley:

Yeah, I can't imagine. I thank God for the recruiters right. Yes, they're amazing.

Leigh :

Love them.

Ashley:

Now the second part of that question is you mentioned exclusionary criteria, or at some point perhaps a patient has to be pulled off of a trial. Is that something you have to tell the patient? Is that your job to do that, and if so, is that a hard conversation? I'm thinking of when I do a biopsy on a patient and I have to tell the patient that unfortunately, they have a type of cancer. That's a very hard conversation for me a lot of times. When you have to pull a patient off of one of these trials because of an exclusionary criterium, is that a hard, sad conversation?

Leigh :

Yeah, so I'll just go. I'll go back to why patients might be in a trial. So patients come to us or are interested in being in trials for a few different reasons. One might be because they're altruistic, they just want to do good, they want to make a difference, and so we have. That's one side of it. The other side of it is that they may have a disease that they can't get a particular treatment for unless they participate in a trial, and this is a good opportunity for them to possibly do so free of charge, along with diagnostic testing and things like that. So that could be another reason. And then I would say, like the third biggest reason might be financial gain. So those three things are why people might do it, and it may be some combination of the three. Right, you can't blame people. It's nice to get paid for your time and effort.

Leigh :

Trials they require work. We patients have to come in several times during the trial at least. Sometimes we have to repeat lab work. If something happened with the labs or if they had a value that was not acceptable, we might have to repeat it. So it is a commitment, and we understand that.

Leigh :

When I have to explain to someone that we have to end their participation in a trial or if I have to let them know that they don't meet criteria to be in the trial. It can be difficult. My first, the first thing I always start with, especially if it's for a medical exclusion, is that, say, patient safety comes first. So if, for whatever reason, they're excluded because of some medical condition or a finding during the screening that makes it so that they're not a candidate anymore, I tell them exactly that you don't meet the criteria because X, y and Z and this is a clinical trial and you may be affected negatively if we proceed based on whatever the finding is. And usually if you go that route and explain that it's just about keeping patients safe, that's the number one priority.

Leigh :

Yes, we're trying to do research, find out all sorts of cool new things, but patient safety is number one. And then most times people are great about it and they understand and they'll just want to get involved in another trial soon, especially if they're doing it because they've done many before. So people are generally understanding. Especially they're appreciative if we are cautious and it's a safety concern. They're understanding If it's somebody that might have come in more for the financial gain of being in a research study. It can be a little trickier but honestly we don't really have a big problem People if they did it because they have an underlying condition that they were hoping to get treatment for, of course it's very disappointing for them, but I think you know people that participate in clinical research do realize that whatever is being studied is for a certain population, so generally it's not a huge problem.

Ashley:

That was absolute gold and I am so glad that you broke that down so well. Thank you. I feel like that was just like a mini TED Talk. Patient safety coming first and patient safety being most important is huge, and I am so glad that you mentioned that, because I do think that there are a lot of misconceptions and a lot of you know, maybe people having the wrong idea of what clinical trials are for and our company's just trying to push their drugs, or are they actually looking out for the betterment of humans? And so the fact that you highlighted that it just it brings me such joy and it makes me so happy, and the fact that your patients understand that too.

Ashley:

Really, it sounds like just going into it, and perhaps, again, we should just applaud the recruiters for how well of a job that they do, but to understand that these trials are important not just for them, but for the human race, for all of us, to develop these fantastic therapeutics and these fantastic devices. So very well done, keeping it patient centric. I think that's important and so amazing. I mentioned misconceptions. That's always a fun question. In your opinion, what do you think the biggest misconception is about clinical research right now?

Leigh :

Something that I have heard in the past are that you know you just want to use us as guinea pigs, and I think that certainly a lot of people probably feel that way. If I just break down clinical research a bit more and talk about the different phases of trials, that can be somewhat eye-opening. So, for example, we do phase one through phase four clinical trials, and a phase one clinical trial is the beginning of it. Right, that's when you're really looking. If you have an investigational product that is being evaluated, safety comes first, as I mentioned. So a phase one trial is one where the focus is safety.

Leigh :

It's very small numbers of participants and you are just looking for any signals for it being unsafe or anything like that, and it's very closely monitored. So it's not like they're just throwing it out there for hundreds and thousands of patients. The numbers are very small. So that's the first step and then, as you move through the phases, the number of patients gets larger. You start looking more at the efficacy and the dosing and things like that, but safety remains a hallmark throughout. All these things are monitored very closely Lab studies for some procedures, ekgs, echocardiograms, other scans, depending on what is being studied, the one thing we don't study where I work is cancer and cancer treatments. But in general we're looking at all the things and trying to monitor for any safety signal from whatever product it is, from a vaccine to a therapeutic medication. That remains at the forefront and I would say that these things are studied ad nauseum. We're constantly looking at different things so to keep everybody safe.

Ashley:

I want to close how we usually open, which is, tell me about your journey, to how you got here. At some point, you knew you wanted to be a PA. I'd love to hear that. And then what? What shifted? At what point did you say you know what? Being a PA is super cool, but there's something more here and I'm going to go seek it out.

Leigh :

Yeah. So growing up I for some reason I don't know I think sometimes you just have this feeling that you want to be something. So from a young age I always wanted to be a pediatrician. I loved kids when I was young, I loved babysitting, I wanted to be a mom all things kids. But then when I got to college, I started to rethink things, and I was. I certainly was like a science background biology and then I started thinking more like, well, what would be a great career for a woman?

Leigh :

My stepdad was a rheumatologist and so I saw all the hours he put into things and he, though he absolutely loved his job. I think he's tried to steer me in a different direction, which I do really appreciate now. Not that I would, I don't think I. I think I would have liked being a physician, but I had other goals too. I mentioned wanting to be a mom. That was something that I knew I wanted to do sooner than later. So he had said what about being a dentist? So then I started to look into that and then I did some shadowing of dentists and realized that wasn't going to be for me. So then I looked into what else I wanted to do and he had a great friend that was a PA. So I spent some time with him. He was like a very autonomous, loved his job. He was a community guy. He had been around for many decades and I'm like this would be perfect.

Leigh :

So I decided to go to PA school. I went to school in Philadelphia, had a wonderful I feel like I had a really great education there. I came out feeling ready to do this and I got into cardiothoracic surgery when I first became a PA in 2006. Then I moved on. I really loved the intensive care or critical care piece of T-surgery, so we moved around a little bit before we settled down. I worked in critical care for just about a decade or so and then I realized that when the kids were young, that I needed something more stable. So I went into cardiology for about eight years or so, which was definitely my favorite. I just absolutely love cardiology.

Leigh :

But I started to feel like I wanted to do more and so, after doing the same thing, what seems every day, even though I love the patients and love being able to help them I just I felt like there was more that I could do. I think the pandemic really turned my attention towards clinical research because, of course, we were trying to roll out a vaccine quickly and I was just curious about the process. I started doing a lot of research and reading a lot of scholarly articles during that time, and so that's what made me start to look into this more, and I found a local research site and, though they didn't have a position available, I reached out and so, having done that, when a job became available, they contacted me, and so that's how I started there Two years ago. I was very, very nervous to take the plunge, but I'm grateful that I did, because there's just so much more out there.

Leigh :

I think if I had stayed in cardiology and I might not have had the energy to go on to get my doctorate of medical science, which was a goal of mine, and I'm grateful that this job had gave me that energy, that work-life balance to be able to go out and do that. With working full-time and having a family and teenage kids, that you know, all the taxiing around to different events. It's been really great and I feel very fortunate that I was called to do this, and I'm excited about the future for sure.

Ashley:

I feel very fortunate that I was called to do this and I'm excited about the future for sure. What a fantastic career journey from cardiothoracic surgery to critical care to cardiology. You've seen patients at their worst and you've cared for them then and now, doing what you're doing, you have your doctorate of medical science. You know, I, I just, you know, I just I loved what you just said about realizing we PAs, we work clinicians, generally speaking, we work in a fantastic field and yet there's always that desire of wanting to do more and there was more that you can do. And I think that is so amazing as a PA these days is that the doors are really opening for this profession, for PAs and for MPs, and and we're being, generally speaking, I think we're being very welcomed by the, by the healthcare community, into these roles and it's so interesting. I'm so glad that you said that about the pandemic.

Ashley:

Covid comes up in every conversation. I absolutely never include it on the question list and it always, always, always comes up, and I think yours is an interesting take on the coronavirus vaccine. We have to admit that the process was interesting and you found that interest and you chased it and look what you're doing now. Because of that. It is just. It is so cool. I'm just so amazed by you and what you're doing and I applaud you. Let's talk to our pre-health students. What skills should they focus on developing if they're looking towards a career eventually in clinical research?

Leigh :

Yeah, I think it's important to get the sciences in and things like that, like you normally would with any pre-health type of role. But for research, you can look into trainings like CITI is a type of training and they have different courses in good clinical practice or it's called GCP. So a good clinical practice or GCP is something that you'd have to get trained in, and the other thing is HSP, which is human subjects protection, and those things are not. If there was a PA who was interested in being a sub-investigator or something it's not something you'd have to go out and do before, but if you had that, if you had done that training, that would look like you were motivated, I think, for a potential employer or if you were looking to get into this type of work. If you have done any of that research, it's very important. All, like I mentioned, all this really focuses around safety of patients and keeping that at the forefront really of all the work that we do.

Ashley:

That is so great, Lee. Thank you so much for joining us on Shadow Me Next. It has been an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much for joining us on Shadow Me Next. It has been an absolute pleasure.

Leigh :

Thank you so much, ashley, I really appreciate it.

Ashley:

Thank you so very much for listening to this episode of Shadow Me Next. If you liked this episode or if you think it could be useful for a friend, please subscribe and invite them to join us next Monday, as always. If you have any questions, let me know on Facebook or Instagram Access. You want stories you need questions? Let me know on Facebook or Instagram Access. You want stories you need? You're always invited to shadow me next.

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Ashley Love

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