Dr. Das is First Recipient of Dr. Satoru and Grace Nakamoto Award

Thomas Das, MD, is the first to be honored with the Dr. Satoru and Grace Nakamoto Award for the Development of Leadership in Medical Humanities and Arts. Dr. Das, whose specialty is cardiovascular disease, is a member of the leadership team of the CardioNerds Academy. The award will support a yearlong digital media and medical education fellowship.

In his application for the award, Dr. Das said, “We feel that our efforts in creating and directing the CardioNerds Academy are aligned with the mission of this award, as we work to establish ourselves as leaders in digital medical education and grow cardiology into an increasingly humanistic, diverse and equitable field.”

Other members of the CardioNerds team are Devesh Rai, MD, Gurleen Kaur, MD, Saman Nematollahi, MD, Daniel Ambinder, MD, and Amit Goyal, MD. Dr. Goyal received the 2020 Dr. William and Roxanna Michener Award for the Development of Leadership in Medical Humanities and the Arts, which provided support for the CardioNerds Podcast.

“We are living through an incredibly vibrant time in cardiovascular medical education,” Dr. Das said in his application. “While the core aspects of learning at the bedside and in-person, one-on-one coaching remain the foundation of our education, there are a plethora of new learning modalities that take advantage of our increasingly digital and inter-connected world.

“From journal clubs held on Twitter to podcasts streamed through mobile devices, educational content is increasingly available at the modern trainee’s fingertips. This digital revolution has not only enhanced the ways in which we learn, but also has the potential to make cardiovascular medical education more humanistic, equitable and diverse. As the educational landscape evolves, it is imperative that both teachers and learners understand how to make the most of digital education, while also understanding the potential pitfalls. Thus, there is a call to action to train the next generation of medical educators; to answer this call, the CardioNerds Academy was born.”