POPULARITY
6 episodes with Swathi
4 episodes with Swathi
4 episodes with Swathi
3 episodes with Swathi
2 episodes with Swathi
2 episodes with Swathi
2 episodes with Swathi
2 episodes with Swathi
2 episodes with Swathi
Being a pharmacist is exciting–as long as you're willing to try new things. These are wise words from my returning guest on today's podcast, who has been paving the way for integrative pharmacy. Dr. Swathi Varanasi is an award-winning pharmacist passionate about the intersection of personalized medicine, patient outcomes, and innovation. With experience spanning patient care, biotech, research, academia, and consumer product goods, Dr. Swathi has paved the way for healthcare professionals to pursue non-traditional career paths through creating postdoctoral training programs, industry internships, and online educational programs. She co-founded and serves as Chief Scientific Officer of the Life Sciences Division at Element Apothec, and serves as a Principal Investigator at contract research organization, Citruslabs. Dr. Swathi received her Doctor of Pharmacy (PharmD) at the Medical University of South Carolina and Bachelor of Arts (BA) at Carleton College. She was the first-ever pharmacist in the United States with formal residency training to specialize in integrative medicine and preventative health. She also completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Medical Affairs in biotech and has training in nutrition from Cornell University. Dr. Swathi has served as faculty and guest lectures at colleges and universities across the country. She is an advisor and consultant for a number of for-profit and nonprofit organizations aiming to make the world a healthier place for us to live–and thrive. She has been published in peer-reviewed academic journals and featured in Yahoo, mindbodygreen, Well+Good, Entrepreneur, Forbes Health, and more. In 2023, Dr. Swathi was voted one of the 50 Most Influential Leaders in Pharmacy. Connect with Dr. Swathi via: Email: swathimvaranasi@gmail.com FB: Doctor Swathi IG: @doctorswathi Linked In:Dr. Swathi Varanasi Check out our earlier episode here: https://www.marinabuksov.com/s03e03-paving-the-unconventional-path-with-integrative-pharmacist-dr-swathi-varanasi/ Visit https://marinabuksov.com for more holistic content. Music from https://www.purple-planet.com. Disclaimer: Statements herein have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. Products listed are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any diseases.
To talk about the increase in requests and what is possible in terms of assistance, Alex Guye spoke with Swathi Sekhar. She is the director of protection initiatives with Rainbow Railroad, a charitable organization that helps LGBTQ+ people escape violence and persecution in their home country. Swathi is also a refugee lawyer with a practice in Toronto focusing on LGBT migrants, refugees and people in detention.
Ellen Kamhi talks with Dr. Swathi Varanasi-Diaz, an award-winning healthcare professional recognized for her trailblazing work at the forefront of personalized medicine and healthcare innovation. She earned her Doctor of Pharmacy from the Medical University of South Carolina and became the first pharmacist in the U.S. to complete a postdoctoral residency in integrative medicine and preventive health. Following this achievement, she co-founded the Integrative Health Pharmacy Residency Program. Her credentials also include a postdoctoral fellowship in biotech and nutrition from Cornell University. Her research has been published in peer-reviewed academic journals and she has served as faculty and guest lecturer at numerous academic institutions. In 2023, was honored as one of 50 Most Influential Leaders in Pharmacy. https://myosmd.com/
Swathi & Shurabi Anphalagan ( @twintalesproject ) are twin sisters who both attend the University of Western, pursuing healthcare-related careers. They use science knowledge to promote inclusion in the “Twin Tale” series of books they've created.They join Ara on this week's episode of #TheTamilCreator to discuss being their innate curiosity and interest in science, choosing Western University ( @westernuniversity ) and healthcare career paths, working at the same jobs together over the years, their thoughts on AI, how volunteering at a local vaccine clinic during COVID-19 led them to spreading joy through the Twin Tales Project, their creative backgrounds helping them transfer knowledge and make it more accessible for the community, and so much more.Follow Swathi & Shurabi:- Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/twintalesproject/) Timestamps00:19 - Ara introduces this week's guest, Swathi & Shurabi02:01 - Working together at the same jobs and being best friends04:08 - Their childhood; being immersed into the Tamil community05:44 - Growing up in Brampton and going to Tamil class07:26 - Choosing Western and healthcare careers; passion for science09:57 - How strong their twin telepathy is; finishing each other's sentences10:30 - Their fourth year at Western and working at Unity Health13:20 - Their “Aha” moment; how the pandemic led to Twin Tales15:48 - Turning their idea into books; storylines, illustration, and publishing18:45 - Fundraising to get the Twin Tales Project off the ground19:36 - Two steps forward, one step back; over a year for a final product20:13 - Did they hesitate before deciding to work together?22:40 - Their parents being supportive during this entrepreneurial venture24:20 - Promoting their books through word of mouth and social media25:50 - Their thoughts on AI; how they see it impacting their careers29:43 - Having four books currently out and planning to release more30:47 - What they envision in 3-5 years; lifelong learning and community impact32:06 - Their biggest learning lessons in recent times; 33:54 - Advice they would give their younger selves35:39 - The personal legacies they want to be remembered for by friends/family37:10 - Why they are inspired by being kind38:29 - Creator Confessions51:17 - The Wrap UpIntro MusicProduced And Mixed By:- The Tamil Creator- YanchanWritten By:- Aravinthan Ehamparam- Yanchan Rajmohan Support the show
Get ready for an inspiring conversation with the Dr. Swathi Varanasi-Diaz, who's shaking things up in the pharmacy world! Named one of 2023's 50 Most Influential Leaders in Pharmacy, Swathi shares her fascinating journey from pharmacy school to becoming a pioneer in integrative medicine and healthcare consulting. With her PharmD from the Medical University of South Carolina and BA from Carleton College, Swathi has blazed quite a trail in pharmacy. She made history as the first U.S. pharmacist to complete a residency specialising in integrative medicine and preventative health. Add to that a biotech Medical Affairs fellowship and a Cornell nutrition certificate, and you've got someone who's seriously dedicated to expanding what's possible in pharmacy! Let's talk about creating your own opportunities! Swathi teamed up with a mentor to create something totally new – the first-ever integrative medicine pharmacy residency. These days, Swathi's rocking it as a consultant and fractional executive in the healthtech and CPG world, while advising various organisations and teaching future pharmacists. Her career path shows just how many doors can open when you're willing to think outside the box! Swathi dropped some serious wisdom during our chat. Here are the golden nuggets: 1. Job Hunting Pro Tip: Those "required qualifications"? Think of them more like a wish list! If you've got transferable skills and enthusiasm, go for it. 2. Networking Made Simple: LinkedIn is your friend! Don't be shy about reaching out to people doing interesting things – the worst they can do is not respond. 3. Regular Check-ins: Take time every few months to reflect on what you're enjoying in your work and what you might want to change. 4. Creating Opportunities: Wherever you land, think about how you can create opportunities for others, especially students. 5. Transferable Skills Matter: Your pharmacy background is valuable in unexpected places – you just need to show people how your skills translate. HAVE YOU EVER THOUGHT ABOUT STARTING A PODCAST? Join our weekly newsletter where we pull back the curtain on our podcasting adventures – sharing everything from production hacks to scheduling secrets, marketing wins (and fails), and how to create & build your show while balancing a full life. Subscribe now and let's turn your podcasting dreams into reality. https://anisha-and-sunjay.kit.com/d2058726a3 SIGN UP to my PODCAST NEWSLETTER below so you'll be the first to know when new episodes are being released. You'll also receive regular inspiration, tips, tools, and free content. https://pharmacistdiaries.ck.page/newsletter PARTNERSHIPS and DISCOUNTS: The Naked Pharmacy is offering my podcast listeners a 20% discount on all their products. Use discount code PD20 at checkout to receive the offer. https://www.thenakedpharmacy.com/
Dr. Wendy is offering her Wendy wisdom with her drive by makeshift relationship advice. PLUS we are talking to Dr. Swathi about the downside of magic weight loss medications. It's all on KFIAM-640!
Character assassination, honor killing, and unrequited love are among the theories that circulated following the murder of Swathi, an event that sent shockwaves across the nation in 2016. This tragedy has raised significant concerns regarding the safety of women at railway stations. Ramkumar was apprehended in Tirunelveli based on suspicion. Given that the accused has denied any involvement in the murder, how has the investigation progressed? Has justice been achieved for both Ramkumar and Swathi? Engage with this episode to unravel the complexities of the Swathi murder case.
A 24-year-old woman was brutally murdered in public at the Nungambakkam railway station in Chennai. This shocking incident has led to various speculations, including theories of honor killing and unrequited love. The arrested suspect, Ramkumar, has claimed that he is not connected to the crime. What evidence led to his arrest? Has justice been served in the Swathi murder case? Join us as we explore the intricate details surrounding this case.
In a follow-up to a previous discussion on the Starship, Ashwin and Swathi delve into the Next Generation Launch Vehicle (NGLV), a cutting-edge rocket recently green-lit by India's Union Cabinet, analysing its potential to revolutionise the country's space program. All Things Policy is a daily podcast on public policy brought to you by the Takshashila Institution, Bengaluru. The Takshashila Institution has designed the 'Technopolitik: A Technology Geopolitics Survey' to understand and assess what people think about how India should navigate high-tech geopolitics. Please take this 5-minute survey at the following link: https://bit.ly/technopolitik_survey Find out more on our research and other work here: https://takshashila.org.in/... Check out our public policy courses here: https://school.takshashila.org.in
Dr. Swathi Varanasi-Diaz, also known as Dr. Swathi, is an award-winning pharmacist passionate about the intersection of personalized medicine and healthcare innovation. With experience spanning patient care, biotech, clinical research, academia, and CPG, Dr. Swathi has paved the way for healthcare professionals to pursue non-traditional career paths through creating postdoctoral training programs, industry internships, and online educational programs. Dr. Swathi founded and runs Varanasi & company, a full-service consulting and advisory group for healthtech and CPG companies. She has been published in peer-reviewed academic journals and featured in Yahoo, mindbodygreen, Well+Good, Self, Men's Health, Entrepreneur, Forbes Health, and more. In 2023, Dr. Swathi was voted one of the 50 Most Influential Leaders in Pharmacy. Dr. Swathi received her Doctor of Pharmacy (PharmD) at the Medical University of South Carolina and Bachelor of Arts (BA) at Carleton College. She is the first pharmacist in the United States with formal postdoctoral residency training specializing in integrative medicine and preventative health. She also completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Medical Affairs in biotech and a nutrition certificate from Cornell University. We discuss: Her unique career path at the intersection of integrative medicine, pharmacy and entrepreneurship and how you can follow your curiosity to find work that fits your passions and skills How she manages her time working with so many different companies The value of integrative medicine and the importance of creating your own definition of what health and wellness means The many lifestyle factors that can be tested before supplements or medication if we really look at the whole person The work she does with CPG companies, how she decides what type of companies she works with and what YOU should look for when choosing supplements, snacks and other wellness products to ensure they're safe and meet efficacy standards Why she keeps her wellness practices simple, how to pick the ones that work for you and that Instagram isn't reality The critical role of muscle for longevity and quality of life but the recognition that it's part of a multi-faceted approach that includes nutrition, movement and mindfulness. Common misconceptions about health including nutrition, supplements, and exercise Practical tips for everyday life and how you can take charge of your health by understanding, asking questions and the science to make informed choices that work for you. Follow Dr. Swathi on Instagram Follow Me on Instagram Find all of my favorites in my shop
Swathi Varanasi-Diaz, Pharm.D., known to audiences as Dr. Swathi is an award-winning healthcare professional recognized for her trailblazing work at the forefront of personalized medicine and healthcare innovation. She earned her Doctor of Pharmacy (Pharm.D.) degree from the Medical University of South Carolina and became the first pharmacist in the U.S. to complete a postdoctoral residency in integrative medicine and preventive health. Following this achievement, she co-founded the Integrative Health Pharmacy Residency Program. Her credentials also include a postdoctoral fellowship in biotech and nutrition from Cornell University. With experience spanning patient care, biotech, clinical research, academia, and consumer product goods, Dr. Swathi is a scientific and medical advisor and consultant with many innovative companies, including MYOS MD. Her research has been published in peer-reviewed academic journals, and she has served as a faculty and guest lecturer at numerous academic institutions. In 2023, I was honored as one of 50 Most Influential Leaders in Pharmacy.
The shocking murder of 22-year-old Swathi in broad daylight at Nungambakkam railway station in Chennai left the public in disbelief. Despite the incident occurring in 2016, many questions remain unanswered. How was this case ultimately resolved? What led to the apprehension of the perpetrator? Join us in this episode to uncover the truth behind Swathi's tragic fate.
The brutal murder of Swathi, an employee at Infosys, at the Nungambakkam railway station in Chennai, sent shockwaves across the globe. What transpired on that fateful day? Stay with us as we delve into the chilling details surrounding the tragic death of this young woman.
In the second hour of The Tiffany Hobbs Show, Tiffany speaks with Dr. Swathi about the potential health risks of popular weight loss medications like GLP-1 and semaglutide compounds, discussing the trade-offs between shedding pounds and possible side effects. The conversation then explores a church in Switzerland that's using an AI Jesus hologram to take confessions, raising intriguing questions about technology's role in spirituality. The hour wraps up with cross talk featuring Michael Monks.
Special Guest: Dr. Swathi Varanasi-Diaz, Pharm.D. – Integrative Pharmacist & Natural Medicine Specialist Points covered · Major red flags associated with GLP-1 weight loss drugs · Accelerated Muscle Loss · Mental Health Side Effects · Gastrointestinal Issues · Off-Label Misuse Biography Swathi Varanasi-Diaz, Pharm.D., known to audiences as Dr. Swathi, is an award-winning healthcare professional recognized for her trailblazing work at the forefront of personalized medicine and healthcare innovation. She earned her Doctor of Pharmacy (Pharm.D.) degree from the Medical University of South Carolina and became the first pharmacist in the U.S. to complete a postdoctoral residency in integrative medicine and preventive health. Following this achievement, she co-founded the Integrative Health Pharmacy Residency Program. Her credentials also include a postdoctoral fellowship in biotech and nutrition from Cornell University. With experience spanning patient care, biotech, clinical research, academia, and consumer product goods, Dr. Swathi is a scientific and medical advisor and consultant with many innovative companies including MYOS MD. Her research has been published in peer-reviewed academic journals and she has served as faculty and guest lecturer at numerous academic institutions. In 2023, was honored as one of 50 Most Influential Leaders in Pharmacy. Website https://myosmd.com/ Social Media: Instagram: @doctorswathi https://www.instagram.com/doctorswathi/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/swathi-varanasi/ Brought to you by the J.C. Cooley Foundation, "Equipping the Youth of Today for the Challenges of Tomorrow."#ItsYourLife #Talkshow #Podcast #Radio #doctorswathiSupport the show: http://www.cooleyfoundation.org/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
THE CAUTIONARY PART OF WEIGHT LOSS DRUGS To be clear, I am NOT anti-weight loss drugs. They have been life changing for several people I know and I think you should lose weight in a way that works best for you. That being said, there are some things you should know before embarking on that path and I've got Pharmacist and integrative health expert Dr. Swathi Varanasi-Diaz joining us to break down the lesser-known dangers of these popular medications and how we can mitigate the risks. She's on at 1pm. Find out more by clicking here.
Swathi Varanasi-Diaz, Pharm.D., is an award-winning healthcare professional recognized for her trailblazing work at the forefront of personalized medicine and healthcare innovation. She earned her Doctor of Pharmacy (Pharm.D.) degree from the Medical University of South Carolina and became the first pharmacist in the U.S. to complete a postdoctoral residency in integrative medicine and preventive health. Following this achievement, she co-founded the Integrative Health Pharmacy Residency Program. Her credentials also include a postdoctoral fellowship in biotech and nutrition from Cornell University. With experience spanning patient care, biotech, clinical research, academia, and consumer product goods, Dr. Swathi is a scientific and medical advisor and consultant with many innovative companies including MYOS MD. Her research has been published in peer-reviewed academic journals and she has served as faculty and guest lecturer at numerous academic institutions. In 2023, was honored as one of 50 Most Influential Leaders in Pharmacy. Contact: Instagram: @doctorswathi https://www.instagram.com/doctorswathi/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/swathi-varanasi/ Website: https://myosmd.com/ or https://myosmd.com/pages/medical-advisors
In the last few weeks, many established software vendors have launched AI-augmented products, helping us move past the hype and get a much more hands-on view of what AI means for Talent Acquisition. There are still a massive amount of unknowns, but it is evident that AI is a chief catalyst in what is now an unstoppable transformation of TA and the broader talent function. AI and automation fundamentally alter the speed and scale at which TA can operate, constantly pushing the boundaries of what is possible. So, what does this mean for TA leaders and practitioners right now? How prepared are organizations for this level of transformation, and how can TA raise its game to drive more value for the organization? This week, my guests are Dr. Swathi Palasamudram, Enterprise Business Architect at Bosch, and Nazim Ünlü, Global People and Organization Lead at Novartis, in two interviews recorded at the Smartrecruiters Hiring Success event in Amsterdam in September. Swathi and Nazim shared insights that reveal why the transformation of talent acquisition is truly unstoppable—and how TA leaders can harness this momentum to not only keep pace but lead the way. In the interviews, we discuss: Fear, Adaptability, and the critical importance of strategic thinking Current AI use cases. How AI can raise the value of TA to the business Regional variations in AI adoption Retaining the vital human element of TA and HR Data literacy Building a personalized candidate experience The difference between Automation (efficiency through technology) and AI (insights and decision-making) Advice for TA Leaders Follow this podcast on Apple Podcasts.
In the last few weeks, many established software vendors have launched AI-augmented products, helping us move past the hype and get a much more hands-on view of what AI means for Talent Acquisition. There are still a massive amount of unknowns, but it is evident that AI is a chief catalyst in what is now an unstoppable transformation of TA and the broader talent function. AI and automation fundamentally alter the speed and scale at which TA can operate, constantly pushing the boundaries of what is possible. So, what does this mean for TA leaders and practitioners right now? How prepared are organizations for this level of transformation, and how can TA raise its game to drive more value for the organization? This week, my guests are Dr. Swathi Palasamudram, Enterprise Business Architect at Bosch, and Nazim Ünlü, Global People and Organization Lead at Novartis, in two interviews recorded at the Smartrecruiters Hiring Success event in Amsterdam in September. Swathi and Nazim shared insights that reveal why the transformation of talent acquisition is truly unstoppable—and how TA leaders can harness this momentum to not only keep pace but lead the way. In the interviews, we discuss: Fear, Adaptability, and the critical importance of strategic thinking Current AI use cases. How AI can raise the value of TA to the business Regional variations in AI adoption Retaining the vital human element of TA and HR Data literacy Building a personalized candidate experience The difference between Automation (efficiency through technology) and AI (insights and decision-making) Advice for TA Leaders Follow this podcast on Apple Podcasts.
In the last few weeks, many established software vendors have launched AI-augmented products, helping us move past the hype and get a much more hands-on view of what AI means for Talent Acquisition. There are still a massive amount of unknowns, but it is evident that AI is a chief catalyst in what is now an unstoppable transformation of TA and the broader talent function. AI and automation fundamentally alter the speed and scale at which TA can operate, constantly pushing the boundaries of what is possible. So, what does this mean for TA leaders and practitioners right now? How prepared are organizations for this level of transformation, and how can TA raise its game to drive more value for the organization? This week, my guests are Dr. Swathi Palasamudram, Enterprise Business Architect at Bosch, and Nazim Ünlü, Global People and Organization Lead at Novartis, in two interviews recorded at the Smartrecruiters Hiring Success event in Amsterdam in September. Swathi and Nazim shared insights that reveal why the transformation of talent acquisition is truly unstoppable—and how TA leaders can harness this momentum to not only keep pace but lead the way. In the interviews, we discuss: Fear, Adaptability, and the critical importance of strategic thinking Current AI use cases. How AI can raise the value of TA to the business Regional variations in AI adoption Retaining the vital human element of TA and HR Data literacy Building a personalized candidate experience The difference between Automation (efficiency through technology) and AI (insights and decision-making) Advice for TA Leaders Follow this podcast on Apple Podcasts.
Welcome back to another episode of Science of Slink! Today we are talking about a very important topic for furthering pole success, how to do spin pole without getting dizzy. Disclaimer: performance advice, NOT medical advice--if you're suffering from vertigo or dizziness talk to the other kind of doctor. We will discuss what the vestibular system is, things that can affect nausea, what is vestibular system adaption, and some drills that will help. So what is the vestibular system? Your vestibular system controls your sense of movement & orientation. The body has loops of the inner ear (kind of like a level filled with "glitter", the otoliths) and Cilla (tiny hairs in the inner ear) that hold fluid, and when that fluid moves, those fluids inform your body of where it is in space. The vestibular system is also very closely connected to the visual system. More resources are attached below for more information on the visual system Things that can affect dizziness, especially nausea include aging, (targeted exercises can help!) dehydration, hormonal disorders, especially low estrogen, duration & intensity such as adding plane of motion, and heat exhaustion or sensitivity One way to improve dizziness is by practicing vestibular system adaptation. Some ways to practice this are getting better at interpreting & recovering from intense vestibular inputs and balance! Some drills you can try as well are vision drills, head movement drills, some pole-specific gentle head movements at the start of practice that can help prepare you, spin drills, and start SLOW. Additionally, neuro performance is an increasingly active area of research (addressing sub-clinical problems) Slink Through Strength Email Sign Up: http://eepurl.com/iimjnX Join pole instructor & personal trainer Rosy Boa as she chats with experts about the evidence-based practices you can introduce to your pole journey to improve your pole journey and feel better. The Evidence-Based Pole Podcast aims to help pole dancers feel better on and off the pole by talking with experts and diving into relevant scientific research to find evidence-based insights we can apply to our pole journeys. It's a production of Slink Through Strength, the inclusive, evidence-based online pole studio, which can be found online at slinkthroughstrength.com. Edited by: Simone Rossette Simone.rossette77@gmail.com Sources: Clinic, Cleveland. “Vestibular System: Function & Anatomy.” Cleveland Clinic, 2024, my.clevelandclinic.org/health/body/vestibular-system. Somisetty, Swathi, and Joe M Das. “Neuroanatomy, Vestibulo-Ocular Reflex.” PubMed, StatPearls Publishing, 2020, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK545297/. Jahn, Klaus. “The Aging Vestibular System: Dizziness and Imbalance in the Elderly.” Advances in Oto-Rhino-Laryngology, vol. 82, 2019, pp. 143–149, www.karger.com/Article/Abstract/490283, https://doi.org/10.1159/000490283. Altın, Büşra, and Songül Aksoy. “Is Inadequate Water Intake a Risk Factor for Vestibular Disorders?” The Journal of International Advanced Otology, vol. 18, no. 3, 1 May 2022, pp. 264–268, pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35608497/, https://doi.org/10.5152/iao.2022.21303. El, Rhizlane, et al. “Vestibular Disorders and Hormonal Dysregulations: State of the Art and Clinical Perspectives.” Cells, vol. 12, no. 4, 18 Feb. 2023, pp. 656–656, https://doi.org/10.3390/cells12040656.
Dr. Hoffman continues his conversation with Swathi Varanasi-Diaz, Pharm.D., Integrative Pharmacist, about the hidden risks of popular GLP-1 drugs, including muscle loss and mental health side effects.
Integrative Pharmacist Dr. Swathi Varanasi Diaz details the impact and considerations of GLP-1 drugs, which are being lauded for their effectiveness in weight loss and obesity treatments. These drugs have seen widespread use, with statistics showing their intake by millions of Americans. However, the discussion also highlights the challenges associated with their use, including high costs, significant side effects, and a potential for weight rebound upon discontinuation. Dr. Diaz, a pharmacist with expertise in integrative medicine, provides insights into how these drugs work, their possible gastrointestinal and mental health side effects, and how they might be complemented with a proper lifestyle to enhance results. The conversation introduces Fortetropin as a natural product to possibly counteract muscle loss associated with GLP-1 drugs, and the natural myostatin inhibitor MYOS MD to also counteract weight loss related sarcopenia Throughout, the episode underscores the importance of a personalized approach to weight loss involving diet, exercise, and possible pharmaceutical interventions, while highlighting the necessity of caution and thorough consideration in adopting these treatments.
Send us a Text Message.This month, we welcome Swathi Joshi, VP of SaaS Cloud Security at Oracle, to discuss key moments and decisions that shaped her career path, including rejections from Google and Twitter. She emphasizes the importance of learning from rejection and seeking feedback to improve. Swathi also shares insights on the role of mentors and advises on finding and working with mentors. In the second part of the conversation, she discusses building a SaaS security program as an enterprise consumer of SaaS. She highlights the importance of addressing misconfigurations, ensuring visibility and access control, and meeting compliance needs. Swathi also suggests asking about backup and exploring risk scoring for vendors. In this conversation, Swathi discusses best practices for managing vendor risk, vulnerability management through third parties, and incident response in SaaS applications. She also shares insights on privacy operations and critical privacy controls in SaaS. Swathi emphasizes the importance of collaboration, robust incident response plans, and data lifecycle management. She also highlights the need for identity and access control and the challenges of normalizing incident response across different SaaS platforms. Swathi's leadership philosophy is collaborative and pace-setting, and she emphasizes the importance of stress management.TakeawaysLearn from rejection and seek feedback to improveBuild long-term relationships with mentors and create a personal advisory boardWhen building a SaaS security program, focus on addressing misconfigurations, ensuring visibility and access control, and meeting compliance needsAsk about backup and explore risk scoring for vendors. Managing vendor risk requires close collaboration with privacy, legal, and contract partners.Incident response in SaaS applications shares foundational principles with traditional on-prem software, but there are differences in data snapshotting and managing dependencies.Privacy operations can be operationalized by focusing on identity, access control, and data lifecycle management.Leadership should be collaborative, open to ideas, and adaptable to different situations.Stress management is crucial for effective leadership and should be acknowledged and actively managed.LinksPrivacy Operations TemplateSwathi's LI ProfileChapters00:00 Navigating Career Challenges and Learning from Rejection08:13 The Role of Mentors in Career Growth15:26 Building a Strong SaaS Security Program21:20 Meeting Compliance Needs in a SaaS Environment21:56 Backup and Risk Scoring for SaaS Vendors22:38 Managing Vendor Risk26:12 Improving Vulnerability Management through Third Parties26:35 Navigating Incident Response in SaaS Applications34:03 Operationalizing Privacy Operations in SaaS40:50 The Importance of Collaboration in Leadership43:04 Managing Stress for Effective LeadershipSecure applications from code to cloud.Prisma Cloud, the most complete cloud-native application protection platform (CNAPP).Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
Commercializing your femtech or healthtech product can be challenging, especially for early-stage founders. Bringing a product to market often involves detailed customer research and product testing, developing impactful launch and communication strategies, removing barriers to consumer adoption, identification of the proper reimbursement pathway, and more. In this episode of the FemInnovation Podcast, host Bethany Corbin sits down with Swathi Rangan and Daniella Kapural from Herspiegel to discuss the secrets for product commercialization success. The trio discusses what product commercialization means, when femtech founders should start thinking about a product commercialization strategy, common product commercialization mistakes, how to identify applicable business models, how to determine product differentiators and develop a value proposition, and much more! Don't miss this in-depth discussion to enhance your product commercialization strategy and experience. About Swathi Rangan:As a Principal at Herspiegel, Swathi leverages her passion and expertise within the sciences and strong problem-solving skills to help pharmaceutical clients swiftly address complex business challenges. She excels at developing and leading teams to craft successful commercial solutions, in collaboration with the client.Throughout her tenure at Herspiegel, Swathi has led projects with a variety of clients, ranging from large to mid-size, and start-ups. She has deep knowledge in a variety of therapeutic areas including women's health, immunology, oncology, cardiometabolic disorders, and rare disease. Her expertise includes leading strategy and implementation across commercial projects with a strong focus on data and insight-driven innovation; projects include patient support and experience design, digital health partnership implementation, and go-to-market strategy development. She also specializes in creating comprehensive market-shaping strategies for complex disease states and has successfully managed numerous product launches.About Daniella Kapural: Daniella began her consulting career at Herspiegel with a fervent commitment to enhancing the patient experience through strategic problem-solving and innovation. During her tenure, she cultivated a passion for advancing women's health, focusing on devising solutions to address the diverse and complex healthcare needs unique to women across the continuum of care.As a Consultant, she has demonstrated exceptional leadership and support across a diverse array of projects, encompassing product launch, brand planning, go-to-market strategy development, digital health integration, and change management implementation. She serves a broad spectrum of clients, ranging from start-ups to established pharmaceutical giants, lending her expertise across various therapeutic areas such as women's health, oncology, cardiovascular disorders, and neurology. RELEVANT LINKS: More about Herspiegel at this website. Connect with Swathi Rangan on Linkedin. Connect with Daniella Kapural on LinkedIn. Follow Our Host, Bethany Corbin: WEBSITE | LINKEDIN | INSTAGRAM | ADDITIONAL LINKS
Swathi grew up in India speaking multiple languages. She talks with Maya about how her stuttering influenced interactions, often prompting language shifts. Transitioning into her career as a software engineer, Swathi finds solace in a supportive workplace environment, sharing her experiences through writing to advocate for inclusivity. In this episodeSwathy's blog post Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/proud-stutter/exclusive-content
Dr. Swathi Varanasi, or Dr. Swathi for short, is an award-winning bilingual pharmacist specializing in integrative health and botanical medicine. She is a plant-based wellness expert; a medical consultant for CBD, adaptogen, and health food brands; a published clinical researcher; an advocacy non-profit board of directors; a multimedia content contributor; and a matcha enthusiast. Emphasizing an innovative and evidence-based approach, Dr. Swathi is passionate about educating practitioners, students, and patients on natural medicines, and empowering everyone to be the best, most authentic version of themselves.
Interviewer info Lyssa Rome is a speech-language pathologist in the San Francisco Bay Area. She is on staff at the Aphasia Center of California, where she facilitates groups for people with aphasia and their care partners. She owns an LPAA-focused private practice and specializes in working with people with aphasia, dysarthria, and other neurogenic conditions. She has worked in acute hospital, skilled nursing, and continuum of care settings. Prior to becoming an SLP, Lyssa was a public radio journalist, editor, and podcast producer. In this episode, Lyssa Rome interviews Teresa Gray about creating equitable services for people with aphasia who are bilingual, non-English speaking, and historically marginalized groups. Guest info Dr. Teresa Gray is an Associate Professor in the Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences at San Francisco State University, where she directors the Gray Matter Lab. Teresa's research aims to improve aphasia health care outcomes for historically marginalized populations. Her research interests include bilingual aphasia, the mechanisms of language control in aphasia, and the role of language rehabilitation and its short-term and long-term effects on functional communication. Her team is working to develop evidence-based treatment methods for non-English speaking persons with aphasia, as well as bilingual persons with aphasia. In addition, the Gray Matter Lab hosts identity-based conversation clubs. The goal of these groups is to increase quality of life for the participants, and the lab is starting to examine why these groups are so meaningful to the participants. Listener Take-aways In today's episode you will: Understand why careful listening is important when working with bilingual and non-English-speaking people with aphasia and their families. Describe how speech-language pathologists can tailor their treatment to meet the needs of bilingual people with aphasia. Learn about identity-based aphasia groups. Edited transcript Lyssa Rome Welcome to the Aphasia Access Aphasia Conversations Podcast. I'm Lyssa Rome. I'm a speech language pathologist on staff at the Aphasia Center of California, and I see clients with aphasia and other neurogenic communication conditions in my LPAA-focused private practice. I'm also a member of the Aphasia Access Podcast Working Group. Aphasia Access strives to provide members with information, inspiration, and ideas that support their aphasia care through a variety of educational materials and resources. I'm today's host for an episode that will feature Dr. Teresa Gray, who was selected as a 2023 Tavistock trust for aphasia Distinguished Scholar, USA and Canada. In this episode, we'll be discussing Dr. Gray's research on aphasia treatment for bilingual and non-English speakers with aphasia, as well as identity-based aphasia conversation groups. Dr. Teresa Gray is an associate professor in the Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences at San Francisco State University, where she directs the Gray Matter Lab. Teresa's research aims to improve aphasia health care outcomes for historically marginalized populations. Her research interests include bilingual aphasia, the mechanisms of language control and aphasia, and the role of language rehabilitation and its short-term and long-term effects on functional communication. Her team is working to develop evidence-based treatment methods for non-English-speaking persons with aphasia, as well as bilingual persons with aphasia. In addition, the Gray Matter lab hosts identity-based conversation clubs. The goal of these groups is to increase quality of life for the participants. The lab is starting to examine why these groups are so meaningful to the participants. Theresa Gray, welcome to the Aphasia Access Conversations Podcast. I'm really glad to be talking with you. Teresa Gray Thanks so much, Lyssa. It's great to be here today. Lyssa Rome So I wanted to start by asking you what led you to study bilingualism and aphasia? Teresa Gray Sure, that's a great question. So, you know, really it was about curiosity. And so when, when I finished my master's in speech language pathology, I was working in Los Angeles at Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center. And I was working alongside a phenomenal group of speech language pathologists and a rehabilitation team, and it was just a wonderful experience. And a lot of our patients were bilingual. Some people were monolingual, non-English speakers. And it was just a situation where I was learning more and more about how to treat this population that may not speak English, even though a lot of our aphasia materials are based on English speakers. And in addition to that, I was curious to know more how does language present after stroke? If someone is a simultaneous bilingual versus a sequential bilingual, does that affect life after stroke? What about proficiency? What about language dominance? What about age of acquisition, all of these issues that go into language presentation—I was very curious about, and there wasn't a lot of research out there. And so, of course, as SLPs, we read the literature, and we really want to know, what is best practice. So when I decided to go back for my PhD, I decided I wanted to go study with Swathi Kiran, who is a leader in the field working with bilingual adults with aphasia. And so I had that opportunity. And I moved from Los Angeles to Boston to go study with Swathi. That's when I really dove into learning more about cognitive control and what that looks like as far as like language control, and how that interacts with cognitive control and how that's represented in the brain, and what that means for our patients. Lyssa Rome And since then, I know you've moved into treatment. Can you say a little bit more about that? Teresa Gray Yeah, absolutely. So after it, yeah. So after Boston, I accepted a faculty position at San Francisco State University. And I continued with the cognitive control work. But that's when I realized, yeah, that's fascinating work. Because it's really better. It's getting to know it's learning more about the brain. And I think that's so important. It's so fascinating. But I think what's also important with our patients is how does the rubber hit the road? How are these people, our patients and their families and caregivers, and the stakeholders, how are they affected by the aphasia? And what does that look like? And so that's when I started, I expanded my research agenda and the program, and I teamed up with Chaleece Sandberg. She was already working on ABSANT, which is abstract semantic associative network training. And that's a treatment that if you train concrete words, they get better. But if you train abstract words, they get better, they improve, but we also see generalization to the untrained concrete words. So when she and I started talking about it, and you know, I bring the bilingual piece. And so we really wanted to develop a bilingual version of ABSANT. And the idea here is that when you treat the dominant language, it improves. But if you treat the non-dominant language, it improves, but you also see cross-language generalization to the untrained dominant language. And as we progressed through these this work, we really we started to realize that it's not just spreading activation that supports the cross-language generalization. There's this level of cognitive control. So to achieve the cross language generalization, we're seeing that not only do you treat the non-dominant language, but patients also need to have intact cognitive control mechanisms at play. So the direction we're moving in is that if we have patients that come to the lab for bilingual ABSANT, we also make sure that we administer some of the nonverbal cognitive control tasks to get a sense of how they're processing that information, because that informs how we interpret the ABSANT performance. Lyssa Rome It sounds like really interesting and important work. And we we've interviewed Chaleece Sandberg on this podcast. I'll put that link in the show notes. Can you can you say more about bilingual ABSANT and what you've learned? Teresa Gray Yeah, sure. So what we've learned, like one aspect that we've come across is that just like, one size doesn't fit all is the same with therapy. And it wasn't before too long that we realized that this bilingual therapy isn't a great fit for all patients. And I'll tell you what I mean, like most bilingual therapies, we're treating patients within monolingual contexts. So you'll treat English and then you treat Spanish. In my lab, one of our goals is we're really trying to be as inclusive as we can. And if a patient comes to us and speaks a language combination, let's say Russian and English, we think about do we have resources? I mean, do I have students available to administer the intervention? Can we norm the stimuli and I've been fortunate enough to have many bilingual students who speak a variety of language combinations. And being in California, most of my students speak English and Spanish, but I've also had Polish-English combinations Chinese-English, Russian-English and a few others. What I'm getting to is that a few years back we had a Tagalog-English English speaking patient, and a very motivated student who wanted to administer bilingual ABSANT. And what we found was that during the English phase, it went as usual but during the Tagalog phase, both patient and clinician reported that it was just, you know, quite frankly, it was weird not to code switch, and it felt constrained and unnatural. And so really the logical next step was to think about, well, really to question, why are we delivering a bilingual therapy in a monolingual context, we shouldn't be doing something where it's more of a code switching based therapy that really fosters the communication that the patient needs. So this was a few years ago, and at the time, we didn't have the bandwidth or resources to address this. And unfortunately, that's how research functions—it's really about capacity and resources. But now here we are, and last summer in 2023, we did start norming our Tagalog data set, and to really move forward with this, a truly code switching, or as some folks are calling it translanguaging, like this new, another phase. So we can actually look at what is most beneficial for these patients who are code switching in their natural environments. And so thus far, we have run one patient who has who has gone through this translanguaging experience. And we're quite fortunate to have two more patients on deck. And so we're pretty excited about this. Lyssa Rome Yeah, that's really exciting. And I think on this podcast, we talk a lot about life participation, the life participation approach is about making therapy as real to life as possible, and I think what you're describing is targeting therapy to the way that people actually use language. Whether you call it code switching, or translanguaging, the way we deliver therapy to people who are bilingual or multilingual should mirror in some way, their experience of speaking more than one language. Am I getting that right? Teresa Gray Yeah, absolutely. And I think it also touches on you know, I think it's important that we listen to our patients, other clinicians, family members, and if you're working with students, listen to your students. For quite some time, my students have been asking about non-English interventions for aphasia. And we all know that the majority of aphasia interventions are based on English speakers. But the thing is, if we're simply adapting English aphasia interventions for non-English languages, does that create treatment resources that are culturally and linguistically appropriate? Now, regarding the cultural piece, oftentimes you can choose stimuli to be culturally appropriate. But what about the linguistic aspects when you take a treatment and simply adapt it to another language? And I think it's important that we stop and think about this issue. And I'm in a situation where my students are thinking about social justice issues within the field of speech pathology, and we're thinking about patient access to services, and what those services are, and are they equitable across diverse linguistic populations? Lyssa Rome It seems like you're talking about really listening to and understanding and asking the right questions of all of the stakeholders—the students, the clinicians, and, of course, the people with aphasia. And, as we were preparing for this podcast, you talked with me a little bit, and I was really interested in what you had to say about, the importance of understanding client's language history and how they use language. And you had some ideas for how to elicit more information about that. Would you mind sharing that for a moment? Teresa Gray Well, one thing I've learned to ask, and I learned this from Maria Muñoz, who's down in Los Angeles. One thing I think it's really important is how we ask questions to our patients and their families. And so rather than asking someone if they're bilingual, which can be a loaded question, and people interpret it in different ways, because some folks think, well, to be bilingual, you need to be highly proficient in both languages. But really, that's not the case, right? Like, we want to know if people have exposure or if they use a language other than English. And so rather than asking you, if someone's bilingual, you can say, “Do you speak another language other than English?” Or “Do you understand another language?” And then people really start to open up. Another important way to ask questions is, you know, who are you directing your question to? Are you asking the person with aphasia about their needs and what they want to do, versus the families? Sometimes families will say, “Our 24/7, caregiver is speaking Tagalog.” Let's say you're Spanish, so they really need to speak Spanish, but maybe the patient wants to get back to their, you know, a club or something, you know, some social group that they're a part of, and they want to practice a different language. So again, you know, the language history, the way we ask questions, I think it's quite important when we're gathering information so that we can develop, you know, these rehabilitation programs for patients. One way that we're addressing equitable services in my lab is that we've thought with my students and I we've thought about going back to the original ABSANT. So original ABSANT was developed for English monolinguals. And we decided to push ahead with a Spanish monolingual version. And this is quite important in the United States. This population, Spanish speakers, are growing, especially in certain areas, of course, in California. We really wanted to see we're assuming that ABSANT can be adapted to various languages. And theoretically, it should make sense. But I think it's important that we have the data that shows it. And so we've in this past year, we've started collecting data to actually show that yes, it is effective, because I think as conscientious clinicians, and in our profession, we talk about best practice. It's important that we show it. And so, moving forward, this is what we're doing and we're quite thrilled that we have the resources and the opportunity to move forward with this type of a project. Lyssa Rome It sounds like you're describing how equitable services starts with research that's more inclusive and is itself more equitable. Teresa Gray Absolutely. And I think it also it reminds me of how do we capture improvement? How do you measure success? Because right now, when we're doing research, or right now, when we're doing research, and also clinicians out there in the field, we talk about data collection, right? How are you measuring improvement? And for us in the lab, we're looking at effect sizes, but sometimes these effects sizes aren't significant. However, the patient reports that they feel more comfortable, and they're more confident at family gatherings, or out in the community, and that maybe they won't ask for help at the grocery store, but if they need to, they're not scared. And I think that is so I mean, that's invaluable. But how do you measure that? And how do we incorporate that into our data collection? And how we report improvement to the funding sources? Right? Because all of us I, you know, you can't get very far when without talking about insurance dollars and how we measure improvement to get more services for our patients. Lyssa Rome I think that that's, that's absolutely true. And I think we have to measure what's important to the person that we're that we're working with. I, I also wanted to talk with you about the identity-based conversation clubs that you have been working on at San Francisco State. Can you say a little bit more about those? Dr. Teresa Gray Yeah, sure. So we do have a few different groups, conversation groups, through my lab. And one group, it started out as just a service to the community. And so we started an English-speaking group. And at first a few years back, we were in person, but we transitioned to Zoom once COVID hit, I was very impressed with my team, because here in California, when things shut down in mid-March, within three weeks, the group was online. Around that time, maybe a few years ago, we started talking about a Spanish-speaking group, we do have many bilingual patients who are Spanish-English bilinguals, a few of these folks are more comfortable speaking in English. That's their emotional language, and it's their human right to use that language to communicate. So my lab put together a team to start hosting a Spanish-speaking group. And what we've seen is that there's just a different dynamic, when you're speaking in the language that you're most comfortable using. Jokes are different. Chit-chat is different. And we found that patients report a great appreciation for the Spanish-speaking group. In addition to the Spanish conversation group, we also have a Black conversation group that's facilitated by Black student clinicians. This group was started back in January of 2022. Lyssa Rome And we spoke with some of the members of that group on this podcast and I'll again, I'll put the link to that in our show notes. And they were the people who participate in that group. Some of the members of that group had a lot of really positive things to say about how meaningful is had been to them to be amongst other Black people who share their experience. So maybe you can say a little bit more about that group? Teresa Gray Yes. So this group, it was started based on public interest. So one day in 2021, I received a phone call from a woman whose father had suffered a stroke. And she said to me, my dad is Black. He frequently attends aphasia groups. But the majority of people are white, where's the diversity? She was essentially asking, Where's the diversity? We know Black people are having strokes. But where are they? And what resources are there for people of color who have strokes? And of course these are important points that she's raising. And, in fact, leading up to this woman's call, my students and I were, we had been talking about starting this type of a group, but I wasn't sure if there was interest. But that being said, we know when we look at health disparities, and we look at the data, we know that Black people have as much as a fourfold higher incidence of stroke than their white counterparts. But Black people are less likely to receive rehabilitation services. And that's just not right. I have, you know, in this group, like you were saying, lists of people are so appreciative, and they're so interested, and they just really value this group. And I've had some of these patients who have said to me, Look, it was the summer of Black Lives Matter, people were getting murdered in the streets, people were rioting, and there was this national discourse going on about it. And they wanted to talk about it. But their aphasia conversation groups, were talking about the weather, or sports or the things that just seemed inconsequential at that time in their lives. And I think this just gets back to the importance when we think about identity groups—what they are for these people with aphasia, and how do we facilitate and coordinate them? And especially, you know, when the majority of SLPs are white and monolingual? How do we step into this arena? And how do we support and how do we, how do we move forward with these, you know, with these groups that are so valuable and meaningful for people with aphasia? Yeah. Lyssa Rome I mean, I think it's incredibly important work. What have you learned about some of the best practices? Teresa Gray Sure, yeah. So I think it's all about, you know, being open and listening, but also learning how are you an ally? How do you ask questions? How do you make yourself vulnerable? Because if you're not sure about something, you want to ask. And, you know, sometimes with these groups, we've all left groups or situations where we reflect upon like, “Oh, I said, I said something—was that appropriate? I don't know.” But again, it's making ourselves vulnerable, and asking you to going back to the group next week and say, “Hey, I heard this, or I said, this, was that appropriate?” I think it's just being comfortable with this kind of discourse. To get there, it just takes practice, which just is, you know, going through the motions and doing the work and going through it and experiencing it. Lyssa Rome It seems like that's something that you've really prioritized within your lab and with your students and in your work. Teresa Gray Yeah, and you know, and we make a point to talk about it, we talk about what it looks like, how it feels, and sometimes those are hard conversations to have. There's literature out there. There's different resources to lean on. But it's definitely I mean, we're all learning as we going as well as we're going and I think it's about having just being reflective, which which can be challenging. But I think that I think as we come through to the other side, we're growing and it's this bi-directional growth, whether it's me and my students, us and the patients, the caregivers, just having these honest conversations because I think our goals are the same, right? Our priorities are to improve quality of life. And and that's essentially what we're doing. Lyssa Rome Coming back to bilingualism, I'm wondering if you have any additional thoughts or advice about use of interpreters, or thoughts for bilingual clinicians? How can they best work with and support people with aphasia? Who are also bilingual? Or who are non-English speaking? Teresa Gray That's a great question Lyssa, because many of us, many of SLPs are not bilingual. And quite frankly, even if you are bilingual, you may not speak the language of that population where you are working. So it's so important that we partner with our interpreters. And know knowing who they are at your site. And this is tricky, because when we talk about this, one recipe isn't for everyone, because all sites are different. The way interpreters are set up in one hospital differs from the next hospital. So you need to know your system and then figure it out. Because if you want to start a conversation group, and you don't speak that language, you're gonna have to team up with the interpreter. And, and I think my advice now is, you know, it's not just about asking the interpreter about that culture or language, it's about doing your homework. So for instance, if you have Spanish-speaking groups, it's important to know what countries your patients come from. And this is valuable because holidays vary across countries, and even within countries holidays and traditions will vary. So you know, when these and these variations can feed into your group discussions. So for instance, around the holidays, people can share what they do with their families, what foods do they eat, how do they celebrate? Last year, we had a Spanish-speaking group, and it was around the Fourth of July. And so rather than talking about the US Independence Day, each participant shared what their country's independence day looked like, and growing up what their traditions were. And people really enjoyed that type of activities. As clinicians, learning about cultures, is so important. I know SLPs, you know, your time is so valuable, right? Like, our caseloads are high, but we can learn bits of information, talk to interpreters, explore topics, and then have activities. And if we go into it with open, you know, just creating a safe space where we're all learning, I think it creates this environment where people feel welcome, and they're comfortable. It's a positive environment when you have an SLP, who may not speak the language, but you have an interpreter who does. And then the participants, of course, they speak that language as well. Lyssa Rome It reminds me of what you were saying earlier about the importance of careful listening to the people that we're working with, including interpreters, right, but also particularly the people with aphasia, who we're serving. Are there any other best practices that you want to share for SLPs who are working with historically marginalized populations of people with aphasia? Teresa Gray Well, I think at the end of the day, it's important that when we go into these environments, thinking about what materials are we using? How are people responding? And creating a space that if we have open eyes, we're open to suggestions. It creates an environment where people are comfortable to share, and, and then even when people give feedback, we can also improve our practice. Lyssa Rome I think that that's at the heart of what we aim to do as, as people who believe in the life participation approach. So thank you for that. I'm wondering as you look ahead, what's on the horizon for you in terms of your research in terms of your work in your lab? Can you tell us a little bit about, about what you're working on now, or what you're looking forward to working on? Teresa Gray Well, one thing on the horizon that we're quite excited about is with our Black conversation club, it has had such a great reception, and the participants are so thrilled to be there, that we really want to dive deeper, and take a look at what makes this group so special. And so we're ramping up now, hopefully we'll be starting soon. I'm partnering with Jamie Azios, who's in Louisiana, and her expertise is in conversation analysis. And so we're teaming up to start looking at the Black conversation club, to look at the discourse and try to figure out well, what are the themes? What is the secret sauce? What is the special sauce that makes this group so powerful? Because I think, you know, when when we have the when you know, when you have data that shows that, and we can write about it and share it with our colleagues, I'm hoping this will inspire and give more of a foundation platform for our colleagues to start groups like this. Because if you have a research paper out there, it's something to hold on to. And it's something to really say like, look, this is effective. And it's worth it's, you know, it's so meaningful and valuable that we should be starting groups like this and other places as well. Lyssa Rome Absolutely. I agree. And I really look forward to that research. I think it's so important. So thank you for doing that work. Dr. Teresa Gray Thank you so much for your work, and for coming on the podcast to talk to us about it. I really appreciate it. It's been great talking with you. Teresa Gray Great, thanks so much. Lyssa Rome And thanks also to our listeners. For the references and resources mentioned in today's show, please see our show notes. They're available on our website, www.aphasiaaccess.org. There, you can also become a member of our organization, browse our growing library of materials and find out about the Aphasia Access Academy. If you have an idea for a future podcast episode, email us at info@aphasiaaccess.org Thanks again for your ongoing support of Aphasia Access. For Aphasia Access Conversations, I'm Lyssa Rome. Links Gray Matter Lab at San Francisco State University Jamie Azios — Aphasia Access Conversations Podcast episode (Second episode) NAA Black Americans with Aphasia Conversation Group — Aphasia Access Conversations Podcast episode Chaleece Sandberg — Aphasia Access Conversations Podcast episode Article: Beveridge, M. E., & Bak, T. H. (2011). The languages of aphasia research: Bias and diversity. Aphasiology, 25(12), 1451-1468. Article: Gray, T., Palevich, J., & Sandberg, C. (2023). Bilingual Abstract Semantic Associative Network Training (BAbSANT): A Russian–English case study. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 1-17. Open access: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/bilingualism-language-and-cognition/article/bilingual-abstract-semantic-associative-network-training-babsant-a-russianenglish-case-study/9B7FD1EDBDAB6FD042CD4714E1548005 Article: Sandberg, C. W., Zacharewicz, M., & Gray, T. (2021). Bilingual Abstract Semantic Associative Network Training (BAbSANT): A Polish-English case study. Journal of Communication Disorders, 93, 106143. Article: Gray, T., Doyle, K., & Rowell, A. (2022). Creating a Safe Space for Black Adults With Aphasia. Leader Live. Open Access: https://leader.pubs.asha.org/do/10.1044/2022-0614-black-aphasia-group/full/
When Swathi West started at Summa Health in early 2023, she embarked on a 90-day assessment that included reviewing job descriptions, along with policies and standards. It's an approach she heartily recommends for a number of reasons. First, in reviewing job descriptions, West founds a lack of detail that could cause confusion around roles and […] Source: Q&A with Summa Health CISO Swathi West: “A Solid 90-Day Assessment Can Make All the Difference” on healthsystemcio.com - healthsystemCIO.com is the sole online-only publication dedicated to exclusively and comprehensively serving the information needs of healthcare CIOs.
In this podcast episode, James Maskell speaks with Swathi Rao, PA-C. She is the owner of Be Well Family Care in Indianapolis, and she was featured in James' book, The Community Cure, to showcase her successful implementation of group visits. We explored the clinical applications of vitamin K2, which range from musculoskeletal and immune health to aesthetics and longevity. Swathi also shared how her knowledge on vitamin K2 nutrient therapy has developed throughout her career, how to identify patients who may benefit from vitamin K2 therapy and the benefits of combining vitamin K2 with vitamin D, including dosing recommendations. Swathi emphasized the importance of patient education to enable informed decision-making when it comes to controversial health topics like vitamin K2 supplementation. She also provided insights on building a successful practice and the role of non-MD professionals in healthcare. Please download and listen to learn more about: The forms of vitamin K and which are most beneficial When it is appropriate to recommend this nutrient Swathi's experience with local Functional Forum meetups Vitamin K2 uses for aesthetics and longevity And much, much more! Related resources: Episode with Dr. Leon Schurgers on vitamin K Be Well Family Care Dr. Robin Berzin on the Functional Forum
Dr. Swathi Kiran is the Founding Director Of The Centre for Brain Recovery and her research has enabled the development of the constant therapy Aphasia Recovery App. The post Dr. Swathi Kiran – Overcoming Aphasia: New App Improves Access To Therapy appeared first on Recovery After Stroke.
This week I am talking to a former client, Swathi Gannavaram, about her experience moving from a bench scientist role to Alliance Management. But this episode has a twist. I worked with Swathi about a year ago, and I wanted her to share her experience of what her career has been like since we stopped coaching.What are the things that stuck with her? What have been the sustainable results she experienced? She is sharing what the coaching experience is like but also what her career and development look like a year after coaching. How fun this that?Mentioned in this Episode:Connect with Swathi on LinkedInWhat You'll Learn:Swathi's views on coaching and mentorship - and how you can use both to achieve your goalsThe impact of coaching on her career after one yearHer story of moving from the bench to the office (even without having experience)How to have a growth mindset to try new thingsHead over to Your Worthy Career for full show notes.Work with MelissaJoin the VIP Email Insiders ConnectLinkedInInstagram
Anish and Swathi went to the US for MS and lived there for 8.5 years before returning to India. As a young family with 2 yr old, Anish and Swathi talk about their reasons to move and rational approach of decision making as well their experiences after moving back to India.
SaaS Scaled - Interviews about SaaS Startups, Analytics, & Operations
On today's episode, we're joined by Swathi Young, Chief Technology Officer, SustainChain, a global systems-based technology platform designed to drive unprecedented collaboration and joint action among organizations with a high commitment to sustainability.We talk about:Key steps to get started with generative AI & MLBreaking down organizational silos to leverage emerging technologiesReducing cloud computing costs & mitigating environmental impacts of MLThe “self-service” trend of empowering business users with tools for decision-makingThe ethics of AI-generated art, writing, & music
Haran, Tarun, Christian, and Harsha are back with a great episode with Harsha's friends in Chicago, Nithin and Swathi! They talk about first impressions of Harsha, before diving into past travels, some deep reflections, and much much more! Make sure to check out @sweetandswathi and @nithincharllyphoto! Have an interesting topic or would like to be featured on an episode? Let us know! Head over to @aninterestingdiscussion on Instagram! --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/aninterestingdiscussion/message
Hi! I'm so happy you're here! Today I'm interviewing my friend, Dr. Swathi Varanasi, or Dr. Swathi for short. She is an award-winning bilingual pharmacist specializing in integrative health and botanical medicine. She is a plant-based wellness expert; a medical consultant for CBD, adaptogen, and health food brands; a published clinical researcher; an advocacy non-profit board of director; a multimedia content contributor; and a matcha enthusiast. Emphasizing an innovative and evidence-based approach, Dr. Swathi is passionate about educating practitioners, students, and patients on natural medicines, and empowering everyone to be the best, most authentic version of themselves.Contact Dr. Swathi:IG: www.instagram.com/doctorswathiwww.doctorswathi.comPrevious Episodes with Dr. Swathi Veranasi: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coffee-and-tea-with-carrievee/id1514671446?i=1000516941097https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coffee-and-tea-with-carrievee/id1514671446?i=1000506749334GET YOUR CARRIEVEE SWAG! https://carrievee.myshopify.com/Book CarrieVee for a Speaking Engagement: https://www.coachcarriev.com/contact-meThe Radical Empowerment Method 2.0 Online Course (no group coaching) Program OPEN FOR ENROLLMENT NOW! https://www.coachcarriev.com/radicalempowermentmethod2Radical Empowerment Method Book on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3Bdp2BCContact CarrieVee!IG: @iamcarrieveeLI and FB: Carrie Verrocchioemail: carriev@coachcarriev.com
Swathi Chettipalli and her husband share clips from the new documentary about their daughter entitled, My Name is Siri. https://www.facebook.com/AutismAwarenessRadioShow/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/autismawareness-radioshow-90b612156/ https://www.instagram.com/designs_by_siri/
Today, Keith chats with author Swathi Young about the AI and Machine Learning ethics framework. Keith asks the hard questions in regards to responsibility and policies. What is Ethical AI? What should CTO's consider in AI projects? What guardrails should citizen data scientists consider?
Show Notes: Dr. Swathi's Website | www.doctorswathi.com Dr. Swathi's IG | @doctorswathi Dr. Swathi's LinkedIn | www.linkedin.com/in/swathi-varanasi Element Apothec's Website | www.elementapothec.com (use PODCAST20 for 20% off!) Element Apothec's IG | @elementapothec The Element Apothec Show | www.pharmacypodcast.com/host/swathi-varanasi Integrative Health 101 | integrativehealth101.teachable.com Cannabis Science & Therapeutics for Pharmacist | www.medicalcannabismentor.thinkific.com/courses/copy-of-cannabis-science-and-therapeutics-for-pharmacists-1?ref=fa803a Sacred Feminine Book | www.doctorswathi.com/the-sacred-feminine
Who is Dr. Swathi Varanasi? Tune into the first episode of The Element Apothec Show to learn about the host–an integrative health pharmacist, wellness entrepreneur, speaker, author, and educator. Dr. Swathi Varanasi, better known as Dr. Swathi, was recently named one of The 50 Most Influential Leaders in Pharmacy. Dr. Swathi has paved the way for other healthcare professionals to pursue non-traditional career paths through creating postdoctoral training programs, industry internships, and online courses. She is a speaker, author, and co-founder of the international award-winning plant-based wellness and skincare brand, Element Apothec. As a healthcare disruptor, she looks for opportunities to break barriers and challenge her western-trained colleagues to think beyond the conventional scope of their practice. Through the many modalities of integrative medicine and patient-centered shared decision-making, she believes that health and wellness is achievable for everyone. Emphasizing an evidence-based approach, Dr. Swathi is passionate about educating practitioners, students, patients, and consumers, and strives to empower everyone to be the best, most authentic version of themselves. Dr. Swathi received her Doctor of Pharmacy (PharmD) from the Medical University of South Carolina College of Pharmacy (Charleston, SC) and her Bachelor of Arts in Spanish from Carleton College (Northfield, MN). She is certified in Plant-Based Nutrition from Cornell University. Dr. Swathi serves adjunct faculty and has guest lectured at colleges, universities, and conference stages worldwide. She has been published in peer-reviewed academic journals and has been featured in Forbes, Entrepreneur, Yahoo, Well+Good, and mindbodygreen. Dr. Swathi lives in Los Angeles, CA, and Toronto, ON, Canada. In her free time, she can be found delving into personal development, spending time with her fiancée, learning about sustainable fashion, or planning her next trip (35 countries and counting!).
Dr. Harris is joined by Dr. Swathi Varanasi, a pharmacist and serial entrepreneur who was recently voted one of the top 50 most influential leaders in pharmacy in 2023. We discuss how she incorporates the principles of Ayurveda into her clinical practice, why continuing education is essential, and the innovative ways she mentors students about alternative careers. Finally, we discuss CBD and her company Element Apothec. It was a wonderful conversation full of take-home points to help you boost your health, EQ and IQ!Element Apothec: https://elementapothec.com/ (use PODCAST20 for a 20% discount) Connect with Dr. Swathi: www.doctorswathi.comSponsors:Nimbus Healthcare: https://nimbushealthcare.comGreat Health and Wellness: https://theghwellness.com
Is There a Pharmacist Shortage? CNN and Forbes reported this week, January 30th - February 1st, through two different stories about a staffing issue due to a shortage of pharmacists throughout the country. The statistics released by the US Department of Labor in fall of 2022 show that the total number of active pharmacists in the United States rose to a new record high of 315,470. Today's guests are Alex C. Varkey, PharmD, MS, FAPhA APhA President-elect Designate; Director of Pharmacy Services at Houston Methodist Hospital - Texas Medical Center and Dr. Swathi Varanasi, PharmD Integrative Health Pharmacist. Alex discusses the American Pharmacists Association stance on the subject of pharmacist shortages and Swathi discusses the changing roles of the pharmacist and her business Element Apothec. Dr. Swathi Varanasi, or Dr. Swathi for short, is a bilingual pharmacist specializing in integrative and preventative health. Dr. Swathi has paved the way for other healthcare professionals to pursue non-traditional career paths through creating postdoctoral training programs, industry internships, and online courses. She is a speaker, author, and co-founder of the international award-winning plant-based wellness and skincare brand, Elēment Apothēc.
Welcome to this edition of Aphasia Access Conversations, a series of conversations about topics in aphasia that focus on the LPAA model. My name is Janet Patterson, and I am Research Speech-Language Pathologist at the VA Northern California Health Care System in Martinez CA. These Show Notes follow the conversation between Dr. Chaleece Sandberg and myself, but are not an exact transcript of the conversation. Dr. Chaleece Sandberg is Associate Professor in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders in the College of Health and Human Development at Penn State University. She directs the Semantics, Aphasia, and Neural Dynamics Laboratory (SANDLab), which focuses on finding ways of optimizing language therapy for adult language disorders, with a primary interest in aphasia. Specifically, work in the SANDLab explores the neuroplastic processes that take place during successful therapy and how to enhance these processes. Additionally, SandLab work explores how cortical reorganization due to aging affects the way we interpret the cortical reorganization that results from language therapy. In today's episode you will hear about: the importance of impairment-based treatment in a person-centered approach to aphasia therapy, the role of linguistic complexity in selecting treatment stimuli and supporting generalization, how speech-language pathologists can add aspects of counseling to treatment activities. Share Dr. Janet Patterson: Welcome to this edition of Aphasia Access Conversations, a series of conversations about community aphasia programs that follow the LPAA model. My name is Janet Patterson, and I am a Research Speech-Language Pathologist at the VA Northern California Health Care System in Martinez, California. Today, I am delighted to be speaking with my friend and research colleague, Dr. Chaleece Sandberg. Dr. Sandberg is associate professor in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders in the College of Health and Human Development at Penn State University. At Penn State, she directs the SANDLab, that is the Semantics, Aphasia and Neural Dynamics Laboratory. Efforts in the SANDLab are aimed at finding ways of optimizing language therapy for adults with language disorders, with a primary interest in aphasia. Specifically, the lab explores the neuroplastic processes that take place during successful therapy and how to enhance these processes. Additionally, the lab work explores how cortical reorganization due to aging affects the way we interpret the cortical reorganization that results from language therapy. In 2022, Chaleece was named a Distinguished Scholar USA by the Tavistock Trust for Aphasia, UK. The Tavistock Trust aims to help improve the quality of life for those with aphasia, their families, and care partners by addressing research capacity related to quality-of-life issues in aphasia. Congratulations on this well-deserved honor, Chaleece. Aphasia Access collaborates with the Tavistock Trust for Aphasia in selecting the awardees and is pleased to have the opportunity to discuss their work and the influence of the Tavistock award. Welcome Chaleece, to Aphasia Access Conversations, Dr. Chaleece Sandberg: Thank you so much for such a lovely introduction. I'm so glad to be here doing this with you and I'm so thankful to the Tavistock Trust for this recognition. Janet: Chaleece, as we said, you were named a Tavistock Trust Distinguished Scholar USA for 2022 and join a talented and dedicated group of individuals. How has the Tavistock award influenced your work, both your clinical and your research efforts in aphasia. Chaleece: So, first of all, I am so incredibly honored to be recognized as belonging to such an amazing group of scholars. These are definitely people that I admire, and I look up to and I want to be more like, and so receiving this award is not only supporting my ability to push some ideas forward that I've been having, but it's also giving me more confidence to go all in and make quality of life, an even larger focus in my teaching and research. Janet: That is terrific to hear, because I think quality of life is so very important for all of us. We sometimes forget that idea when we get focused on our treatment or specific treatment protocol. In preparing for this interview Chaleece, I read several of your publications, including your work in treatment for lexical retrieval, and the Theory of Complexity. Would you briefly describe this theory and your work in this area? Chaleece: I'd love to. The Complexity Account of Treatment Efficacy was introduced by Cindy Thompson, who is actually my research grandma, Lewis Shapiro and Swathi Kiran, who was my Ph.D. mentor. What they were finding was that while they were doing the Treatment of Underlying Forms, which is a treatment that supports sentence processing, when you train more complex sentence structures, like object class, something like, “It was the porcupine who the beaver hit”, right, you're going to get generalization to not only other object clefts, but simpler structures, like WH questions, so something like, “Who did the beaver hit?” Using this logic, Swathi started exploring the effects of semantically based therapies for word retrieval and found that training atypical words in a category promotes generalization to typical words in that category. The idea is that you're basically training this wider breadth of information that applies to more items. In the case of typicality, you're training semantic features that are really characteristic of these atypical items, like that “a penguin doesn't fly but swims”, and that you're also training these really typical features that apply to everything in that category, like, “a penguin lays eggs like most other birds”. In my work, I've extended this logic to training abstract words. Now with abstract words the mechanism of generalization is slightly different. Rather than words sharing semantic features, they share associations. So, we train words in thematic categories, like “hospital” and “courthouse”, where there are these strong associative links between abstract words like “diagnosis”, and concrete words like “doctor”. The reason that it's more beneficial to train abstract words rather than concrete words is because they have a wider range of these associative links, so they can activate more concepts when you get that spreading activation within the semantic system. We've started calling it Abstract Semantic Associative Network Training for that reason, or it's AbSANT for short. Janet: I think that is so fascinating. It makes sense because you're looking at a way to optimize therapy, which is what the SANDLab is all about. How can we, from a theoretical perspective and with data to support what we're doing, how can we be as efficient as possible in achieving the outcome that we would like to have for a person with aphasia? I think it's a perfect example of theoretically based treatment. That leads me though, to the next question to say, I love your research. And I love that it's taken however many years and starting with grandma, Cindy and then Swathi, and now you. That's a lot of effort and a lot of work that clinicians don't have. The theory is so powerful, so I'd like to ask you, what are your thoughts on actions that clinicians might take to easily incorporate these treatment principles, or this treatment, into their clinical activities. Chaleece: I've tried to really consider clinicians and keep clinicians in mind when I've been thinking about AbSANT. One thing that I've done is, I've made absent available for free on my lab website (SANDLab). There's also a tutorial published in Perspectives of the ASHA Special Interest Groups. And the idea is that that's kind of an easy to go to for clinicians. And even though we've only actually used a couple of categories in our research, so we focused on courthouse and hospital, we actually did norming on I think it's 17 categories, thematic categories, like football and holidays. And all of those words are available on the website, I also don't see why you can't create your own categories that are going to be personally relevant for your client. One of our AbSANT clients that we had in our research study, after they were done, the husband wanted to continue to work with his wife on words for the holidays, actually. And so we talked about it, and he came up with some words in the category Christmas, that would be good targets, and they went off and used it. And it helped. They were very happy. Janet: Kudos to you, Chaleece, for doing it like this. What you just described, about a person sitting in therapy and using your words and what you had created, and then going off and creating their own with your assistance, that is exactly what I think should be happening, as we think about therapy. That feeds quality of life, that feeds a person's ability to move back into whatever they want their life to be. Kudos to you for making this freely available to clinicians. They don't have to go digging into research papers or into journals to find and to piece together your work, it's there on your website. By the way, the link to your lab and this information will appear in the Show Notes that accompany this recording. So, thank you for that. I appreciate it. And I know clinicians will as well, Chaleece: I understand being pressed for time, and I did want to make this as easy and accessible as I could Janet: Chaleece, at the heart of your work in aphasia, as we just mentioned a few minutes ago has been optimizing treatment. One of your research interests supporting this direction, has been examining the neurological mechanisms that underlie behavioral change following treatment. Conducting research on this topic is challenging for many, many reasons. Yet, I think it's very important to aphasiology as we seek to understand the elements of a treatment protocol, and how the brain changes in response to stimulation. So, with that large question and that large research area, what have you learned from your work in this area? Chaleece: You are right, it is a very challenging area to work in. One thing that is heartening is that my work seems to agree with some of the heavy hitters out there who are doing this work on a much larger scale. I think that in order to really get at the root of these questions, we do need these really large-scale studies across different sites that are going to be able to gather enough data so that we understand fully what's happening. But basically, it seems like no matter how chronic the person is, there is neuroplasticity related to treatment gains. We still don't really have a definitive answer regarding things like which hemisphere is better? Or is increased or decreased activation better? But it's looking like the answer is actually going to be quite nuanced and related to individual variability, which again, speaks to this idea that the more data the better. Luckily, there is a working group in the Collaboration of Aphasia Trialists, or CATS, that's working on this question. I am a part of that group and very honored to be a part of that group and contributing to this work. I do have some results from a pilot study that I did as a doc student. We found that left inferior frontal gyrus pars triangularis, so basically, Broca's Area appeared to be especially important for the AbSANT outcomes. We also found that when we saw generalization from the abstract to the concrete words, that areas that are normally responsible for concrete word retrieval, were being activated after therapy more so than they were before therapy. That's some nice evidence that generalization is actually affecting areas of the brain that are responsible for those items that are being generalized to. I have yet to analyze the data from my current study but stay tuned. Janet: Oh, we will. I think that there's a large body of data, as you said, from other people who've done larger studies, and lots of people have been focused on this question for a while, and you are as well. It's a bit daunting for clinicians, again, to think about how to wrap your head around the idea and the evidence. We all believe that the brain is changing, but to wrap your head around the evidence that says, “Well, how is this happening?” and, “What can I do that will facilitate it happening a little bit more quickly or a little bit more thoroughly?” So, I realize I'm asking you a speculative question that's sort of out there, but I'm going to ask it anyway. What are some of the ideas from your work that clinicians may find useful to think about on Monday morning, when they walk in to interact with their clients who have aphasia, and their family members and care partners. Chaleece: I think one of the things that I really would like to underline is don't be afraid to challenge your clients. We actually learn better when we're challenged, and learning is what's going to cause those changes in the brain. Probably the most important thing that I would like for clinicians to take away from my AbSANT work is that it's worthwhile and not impossible to work on abstract word retrieval using a semantically based approach. Abstract words are so important for natural conversation. Training them seems to really help support retrieval of concrete words as well, and so you get more bang for your buck. I found that people, especially those with a little bit milder aphasia who are up for the challenge, really enjoy the metalinguistic discussion, and the chance to defend these really strong opinions that people have about the personal meanings of abstract words. And, again, the most important thing in terms of l the neural imaging in the neuroplasticity is that the brain always has the ability to change. I realize that our clients are later in life, they've had a stroke, maybe they're in the chronic phase of recovery, and they can still show neuroplastic changes. One of my highest achievers, in my study, when I was a doctoral student, both behaviorally and neurophysiologically, one of the people who showed the most neurological changes was 20 years post stroke. Janet: That's amazing. When you talk about abstract language, it makes me think that so much of what we do, or at least as I look back on a lot of the treatments that we do, single words or visual nouns or concrete nouns, very simple, sometimes we say functional words. But then you step aside and listen to people talk and so much of what people's conversation contains is nonliteral words and abstract words. We don't talk like the words that we're using in therapy, and it makes perfect sense then, the way you're approaching this challenge of aphasia, to try to make your work more like what people with aphasia are going to experience during conversation. It's a big problem and a big challenge, but I think you're up to it, and I'm looking forward to seeing some of more of your work on AbSANT. Especially since it's such a challenging area of work. I appreciate you giving us specific suggestions of things that we might do Monday morning when we see our patients. So, this is not just a conversation and it's not just another academic lecture in how we think about treatment, but it has some very important real world applications for us. Thanks so much for that piece. I'd like to switch for a few minutes, Chaleece, and talk to you about your interest and work in bilingual aphasia. How did you become interested in this line of work? And more importantly, what have you learned from your work in this area. Chaleece: So, I've always been interested in learning other languages. I have actually attempted to learn a few languages and have not been that successful. But one thing that I realized while trying to learn these other languages is that I was really intrigued by the way languages work. As you're learning another language, you start to really kind of put the pieces together and see kind of under the hood of what's actually happening. And so, I got my undergraduate degree in linguistics, and I think that this kind of fascination with how languages work also partly fueled my interest in aphasia in the first place. I remember sitting in my language in the brain class, and a light bulb went off, I was like, “Oh, my gosh, this is exactly what I want to study!” This idea that this full language system that was completely developed, all of a sudden can get destroyed by damage to particular areas. And so, you know, that kind of set the stage for me wanting to study aphasia. And then when I got into Swathi's lab and she was doing bilingual research, I was so excited. I was like, “Oh, I am totally on board with this”. So, I volunteered for all the bilingual studies that I could, actually not speaking any other languages myself, but realized that I can still research other languages, even if I don't speak them. That was kind of an “aha” moment for me, which was very nice. During my Ph.D., I got to know Theresa Gray, who was a fellow doc student, and she and I became really good friends. After graduation, we immediately began a collaboration. This was good news for me because I had gotten a job at Penn State, and we're in Central PA and there is not a huge bilingual population there. But there is an excellent center for language science at Penn State started by Judy Cole, Janet van Hell and Carol Miller. That has really helped to support my efforts in understanding bilingualism in general, and bilingual aphasia. So, the work that Teresa and I have done together has actually been really focused on getting culturally and linguistically appropriate materials out to bilingual clinicians. That was where we saw that we could do kind of the most good in this area. But along the way, we found some really interesting patterns related to cross language generalization and language dominance and cognitive control. We've also had some really interesting insights from our students who've been working on these projects who have just made comments about the adequacy of the assessments that we're using. And so we're really starting to think about how that's going to affect what we know about people's languages that they speak as we're trying to figure out, you know, what's going on, after a stroke with these different languages. And it also just kind of brings to the surface, that there are so many limiting factors for individuals who don't speak English as their first language or don't speak English at all. There's such an enormous service disparity, at least in the United States, and work in aphasia research has been so English centric, that it's created these major barriers to having adequate services. But luckily, we're starting to kind of get on the ball a little bit, this field is receiving a lot more attention. There are some really great researchers on the case. I've been to some recent conferences where there have been a lot of great presentations. The Saffran Conference was dedicated to this idea, there was a great workshop by Jose Centeno. At the Academy of Aphasia, there were some really great presentations there on this topic. So I feel like we're, we're moving forward in trying to close the gap in services for people who are bilingual. JANET: I agree with you on that. And many times, it's also on the clinician. Clinicians might be bilingual themselves, but they might not be. How can you best support the clinicians who does not share a language with the client or the family members yet still has to serve that individual? It's, again, another challenging area that you've undertaken the study. You are busy, I bet. So in addition to everything you've been doing over all these years, I mean, the complexity and absent and bilingualism, you also have now added something to your area of interest. I'd like you to talk for a little bit about that, if you would, and that is your interest in counseling persons with aphasia. How did you become interested in that area of research? And I ask, because it just seems that there might be a story of a professional journey here. I love to tell stories and hear them, so I think this is a story that wants to telling. Chaleece: All right, well, yeah, twist my arm. Janet: Good, I was supposed to be twisting your arm, because I want to hear your story. Chaleece: So, my husband and I, when we first got to Penn State, we became friends with a couple of people who are over in counselor education. The more we got to know each other and talk more about our work, the more we realized that we were missing a lot of information in each of our fields. I never had any training and counseling, and my friends, who were counselors, hadn't really heard of aphasia. One of these friends, you know, after we had started talking about aphasia, actually, her brother had a stroke and had aphasia and so this became a very personal topic for her. She's a rehabilitation counselor and I was so shocked to learn that this was not something that she had been taught in her training, not something that she had really come across. So, we decided to start lecturing in each other's classes, and start exposing each other's students to these ideas that we felt we had missed out on in our training. We also started digging into the literature, because we wanted to see exactly what was out there, like were we crazy and thinking that this was like missing information from each of our fields. And we weren't crazy, we weren't alone. There's a whole slew of professionals in mental health that don't know about aphasia and SLPs, on the whole appear to not feel adequately prepared to do any sort of counseling. So, we decided that we wanted to write a couple of papers to help practicing clinicians to provide counseling and for SLPs, to kind of understand more about counseling skills, and for counseling students to understand more about aphasia and things that they could do to help people with aphasia, and kind of bring more awareness to the issue. We also applied for some internal funding to start an interprofessional education project, aimed at better preparing our counseling students to work with people with aphasia and our SLP students to provide basic counseling. We're starting this in terms of a one off. We take one counseling student and one SLP student. We need to have them work together with a person who has aphasia, who's expressed some desire for counseling. Every semester we rotate out and have a new group. This has been such a rewarding experience. I've learned so much from my colleagues, the way that I teach my pastor students, the way that I run my research experiments, the way that I mentor students in my lab, all of that has changed so much, I kind of feel like my eyes have been open to this, this whole issue. In turn, I feel like I'm helping my students to be much more mindful in the way that they approach clinical practice and research to like, truly put quality of life first. Janet: I think that's exactly right, and the way we should be thinking, and I agree with everything you said about counseling. We have a little project where we've been looking at motivation, which is different, I realize, but it strikes me that when you think about how we counsel and bring that into our treatment, and also think about motivation, or patient engagement and bring it into treatment, there's so much more that helps us facilitate behavioral change in a patient than just a specific treatment protocol that we're delivering. Because if we haven't got someone who we can empathize with or we can connect with or who's interested in change or understands why we're doing what we're doing, it's going to be a very long road, if we're only focused on the impairment based or the specific treatment protocol. So, I think it's great that you're exposing your students to different professions and really thinking about counseling. It's a great idea. So that's a big journey that you've undertaken, and I'm sure it's not stopping here. It's an interesting journey. It's more exciting as I hear you talk about it; I hear the excitement in your voice and the passion in your voice. It's almost like you want to do everything, but of course, you have to go to sleep, and you know, there are limitations. Chaleece: Right, right. Yeah, all of those things, right? Janet: Yeah. Oh, exactly, exactly. But I will bet that you have a lot of new ideas out there and you are considering some next steps, both in clinical research and clinical activities. I heard this story of starting from a linguistic basis and maybe focused impairment, and now you're completely coming around, I don't think it's full circle, I think it's more like full spiral. You're still thinking about complexity and AbSANT, but you've got other pieces that I think will make a rich program. What are your new ideas that are percolating in that brain of yours that you'd like to see move forward? Chaleece: So, I've applied for sabbatical? I haven't heard back yet whether or not I've received it, but I'm hoping that I can spend the next year focusing my efforts, specifically on what I see as being health disparities. It is related to both bilingualism and mental health and aphasia. So one of the things that I'm really interested in is, is expanding our IP program for counseling and SLP students. I'm also hoping to work with Jose Centeno to work to address service disparities in bilingualism. I know that that's a really big topic of interest for him and our interests seem aligned on there. I'm excited to learn more from him. I'm planning to meet with Amy Dietz and work with her to think more about some of these holistic approaches to aphasia rehabilitation. I've really enjoyed hearing about her yoga program that that she's been doing. I've always had this kind of nagging thought this was something that she and I kind of talked about and really connected on, it kind of goes back to interprofessional practice. It's this idea that we tend to ignore all of these other things that we don't see as being language related, right? We don't think about diet and exercise and sleep on cognitive outcomes. But there's so much research out there showing how these things can affect your thinking. So they must be affecting the rehabilitation outcomes in people with aphasia. I have been interested in the role of exercise in aphasia rehabilitation, we I'm part of an am CDs writing group, and we did a review looking at the effects of exercise and aphasia. There's just a huge gap in the literature. So it's definitely an area that we should be focused on. I don't currently have an exercise research project going but, in the meantime, I have actually partnered with Francine Cohen at Temple to establish Aphasia Cycling Club. This thought had been in the back of my mind for a long time, my husband and I are avid cyclists. And I thought, you know, if people with aphasia could find this much joy in in cycling, and if they could do it together, like that would be great. But then I hesitated because I thought, you know, would they actually be interested? Is this something that anybody wants to do? Am I just a freak, because I like cycling, and I think everybody else should. But I decided to go ahead and reach out through the ARCH network, and I got a surprisingly positive amount of responses back that people were really jazzed about this. Frannie was one of those people that got back right away and said, “I am an avid cyclist, and I would love to do this.” So, I got really excited about it. I got pushed a little bit in the direction by Deb Myerson and Steve Zuckerman, because I don't know if people are aware, but they did this stroke across America campaign where they rode from Northern California all the way to Boston, to spread awareness for aphasia, they have stops along the way. I recommend looking it up because it's a very inspiring journey that they took. These things got me thinking that this could work. We've started meeting with some physical therapists and adaptive sports people in Philadelphia and in Hershey so far, to try and get this going. We're hoping to try and get some people in Pittsburgh as well. We're super excited about where this could go. If anybody listening to this has any suggestions, please contact me. I'm happy to receive any sort of feedback and suggestions that people have to offer. Janet: What a terrific idea! Francine is such an enthusiastic person and. I think with the two of you leading this, it's just going to grow greatly, I think sometimes as we talked earlier, we get so focused on the language, we forget the people with aphasia would like to do other things. Or maybe they did other things before they had their strokes, and perhaps they have some physical challenges right now, so we tend not to think about bicycling. I think it's awesome. A Bicycle Club. That's wonderful. Chaleece: I hope it works out. I hope that it provides people with as much joy as it's provided me, Janet: I bet it will. I can see you doing something like, even if there's someone who has aphasia, who simply cannot end up riding, but if you have riders, and you take videos, and you involve the people who cannot ride with you in that manner, well, that also achieves a quality of life goal. I think. Chaleece: That's a great idea. Janet: Good. I hope it works out. I think of that because we have an friend who's an avid bicyclist, and he always straps on his head camera and will post his videos all the time about places he goes. Your cycling group, your aphasia cycling club, can do the same thing. What a great idea, I look forward to seeing it actually happen and seeing the videos that you make and the work that you do. Chaleece, as we bring this conversation to a close, I would like to ask you to reflect on your interest in aphasia, your work with persons with aphasia and their family members and care partners, and in particular, your amazing journey from starting as a linguist to developing a bicycle club for people with aphasia. And I'm wondering if you have any pearls of wisdom, you might share with our listeners, or what I sometimes like to call Monday morning practices. And by that I mean ideas that clinicians can incorporate into their busy practices quickly and easily to perhaps change their thinking or change how they engage with clients. Chaleece: In reflecting on my journey, I really maybe just to encourage other researchers to think about, so I started out really kind of focused in this kind of an impairment based mode, and gradually moved over to this person centered care, but I haven't discarded the idea of impairments based treatment, right? The idea is that you just kind of, house that in, you know, you fold it in to your person-centered care to the life participation. From my own research, the things that kind of float to the surface for me are, first that the brain can change long after the chronic stage has started. This, this idea of a plateau, I know that I feel like I'm preaching to the choir, probably about this idea, but it's still kind of amazing to me, how many people still feel like this is there's a plateau, right. The other is not to be afraid to work on challenging tasks, like digging into the meanings of abstract words. With supportive conversation I found that this can be very rewarding, even for people who have very limited verbal output. In terms of I don't know, Monday morning practices like something easy to incorporate. I feel like I'll my pearls are kind of borrowed. There's a great one that I borrowed recently from Linda Worrall's amazing presentation as IARC. She suggested a way to form a simple habit was to just ask two questions at every treatment session. This could be a small change just to form better counseling habits as SLPs. She suggested at the beginning of the session to ask, “How are you feeling?”, which is a very different question from “How are you doing?” It allows people to open up a little bit more and actually talk about how they're feeling. Then at the end to ask, “What is the best thing that you're going to do today?” I started doing this as soon as she mentioned, I'm like, I'm going to do this. And I did it. I started doing it with all of my clinical research sessions that I do. It's really helped me to form better relationships faster with my research clients. I feel like they are telling me more about themselves. They really open up at the beginning of the session telling me how they're feeling, and that actually helps me to gauge how I go about this. Yes, for treatment research, you have a protocol, right? But the way you go about these treatment steps, you know, you can frame them in different ways, right? If I have a client who's feeling very anxious, I can say before each thing that we do that's challenging, I can say, “Okay, take a deep breath. All right. Now let's do this. This piece of the puzzle.” That seems to really, really help, It helps me to know where my clients are at to begin with, and asking “What they're doing? What's the best thing that you're doing today?” It's just so much fun to hear people get really excited about what they're doing. Sometimes they might say, “Well, nothing today, but tomorrow, I've got this great thing planned.” It's a really nice way to end the session on a really positive note, Janet: Borrowed or not, those are excellent pearls, and they are simple things that we can do. I do remember Linda Worrall's talk that you were referring to. It makes so much sense. We have these grandiose ideas, but you have to start with a couple of small things and how can you change your behavior tomorrow, very small, but that will pay great dividends. It sounds like those changes have paid great dividends for you already in your research sessions. Today's conversation for me, has been exciting and interesting and thought provoking and would like to thank my guest, Dr. Chaleece Sandberg for sharing ideas, results, outcomes and thoughts from her clinical research journey in aphasia. Chaleece I greatly appreciate your taking the time to speak with me today, and again, congratulations on receiving a Tavistock Scholar Award. Chaleece: Thank you so much. This was delightful. I Janet: would also like to thank our listeners for supporting Aphasia Access Conversations by listening to our podcasts and learning from all of the guests that we've had over the years. For references and resources mentioned in today's show, please see our Show Notes. They are available on our website, www.aphasiaaccess.org. There, you can also become a member of our organization, browse our growing library of materials, and find out about the Aphasia Access Academy. If you have an idea for a future podcast episode, please email us at info at aphasia access.org For Aphasia Access Conversations, I am Janet Patterson and I thank you again for your ongoing support of aphasia Access References Kiran, Swathi, and Cynthia K. Thompson. “The Role of Semantic Complexity in Treatment of Naming Deficits: Training Semantic Categories in Fluent Aphasia by Controlling Exemplar Typicality.” Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research 46, no. 3 (June 2003): 608–22. https://doi.org/10.1044/1092-4388(2003/048 Mayer, J., Sandberg, C., Mozeiko, J., Madden, E. & Murray, L. (2021). Cognitive and linguistic benefits of aerobic exercise: A state-of-the-art systematic review of the stroke literature. Frontiers in Rehabilitation Sciences, 2. https://doi.org/10.3389/fresc.2021.785312 Sandberg, C. (2022). Tutorial for Abstract Semantic Associative Network Training (AbSANT): Theoretical rationale, step-by-step protocol, and material resources. Perspectives of the ASHA Special Interest Groups: 7, 35–44. https://doi.org/10.1044/2021_PERSP-21-00176 Sandberg, C. W., Bohland, J. W., & Kiran, S. (2015). Changes in Functional Connectivity Related to Direct Training and Generalization Effects of a Word Finding Treatment in Chronic Aphasia. Brain and Language, 150, 103–116. Sandberg, C. W., Nadermann, K., Parker, L., Kubat, A. M., & Conyers, L. M. (2021) Counseling in Aphasia: Information and Strategies for Speech-Language Pathologists. American Journal of Speech Language Pathology, 30(6), 2337-2349. Thompson, C. K., Shapiro, L. P., Kiran, S., & Sobecks, J. (2003). The role of syntactic complexity in treatment of sentence deficits in agrammatic aphasia: The complexity account of treatment efficacy (CATE). Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 46(3), 591–607. https://doi.org/10.1044/1092-4388(2003/047) Worrall, L. (2022). The why and how of integrating mental health care into aphasia services. Presentation to the International Aphasia Rehabilitation Conference. Philadelphia PA, June. URLs AbSANT Abstract Semantic Associative Network Training. SANDLab. https://sites.psu.edu/sandlab/projects/absant/ Academy of Aphasia https://www2.academyofaphasia.org/about/ ANCDS Academy of Neurologic Communication Disorders and Sciences. www.ancds.org ARCH Network Aphasia Resource Collaboration Hub https://aphasiaresource.org Collaboration of Aphasia Trialists https://www.aphasiatrials.org/ Eleanor M. Saffran Conference https://www.saffrancenter.com/conferences Stroke Across America https://www.stroke.org/en/stroke-connection/stroke-onward/stroke-across-america
Hi! I'm so happy you're here! Today I'm interviewing my friend, Dr. Swathi Varanasi. Dr. Swathi Varanasi, or Dr. Swathi for short, is an award-winning bilingual pharmacist specializing in integrative health and botanical medicine. She is a plant-based wellness expert; a medical consultant for CBD, adaptogen, and health food brands; a published clinical researcher; an advocacy non-profit board of director; a multimedia content contributor; and a matcha enthusiast. Emphasizing an innovative and evidence-based approach, Dr. Swathi is passionate about educating practitioners, students, and patients on natural medicines and empowering everyone to be the best, most authentic version of themselves.Contact Dr. Swathi:IG: www.instagram.com/doctorswathiwww.doctorswathi.comPrevious Episodes with Dr. Swathi Veranasi: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coffee-and-tea-with-carrievee/id1514671446?i=1000516941097https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coffee-and-tea-with-carrievee/id1514671446?i=1000506749334GET YOUR CARRIEVEE SWAG! https://carrievee.myshopify.com/Book CarrieVee for a Speaking Engagement: https://www.coachcarriev.com/contact-meThe Radical Empowerment Method 2.0 Online Course (no group coaching) Program OPEN FOR ENROLLMENT NOW! https://www.coachcarriev.com/radicalempowermentmethod2Radical Empowerment Method Book on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3Bdp2BCContact CarrieVee!IG: @iamcarrieveeLI and FB: Carrie Verrocchioemail: carriev@coachcarriev.com
Hi! I'm so happy you're here! Today I'm interviewing my friend, Dr. Swathi Varanasi. Dr. Swathi Varanasi, or Dr. Swathi for short, is an award-winning bilingual pharmacist specializing in integrative health and botanical medicine. She is a plant-based wellness expert; a medical consultant for CBD, adaptogen, and health food brands; a published clinical researcher; an advocacy non-profit board of director; a multimedia content contributor; and a matcha enthusiast. Emphasizing an innovative and evidence-based approach, Dr. Swathi is passionate about educating practitioners, students, and patients on natural medicines and empowering everyone to be the best, most authentic version of themselves.Contact Dr. Swathi:IG: www.instagram.com/doctorswathiwww.doctorswathi.comPrevious Episodes with Dr. Swathi Veranasi: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coffee-and-tea-with-carrievee/id1514671446?i=1000516941097https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coffee-and-tea-with-carrievee/id1514671446?i=1000506749334The Radical Empowerment Method 2.0 Online Course and Group Coaching Program OPEN FOR ENROLLMENT NOW! https://www.coachcarriev.com/radicalempowermentmethod2Book CarrieVee for a Speaking Engagement: https://www.coachcarriev.com/contact-meRadical Empowerment Method Book on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3Bdp2BCContact CarrieVee!IG: @iamcarrieveeLI and FB: Carrie Verrocchioemail: carriev@coachcarriev.com
As a western society, we have more and more visibility to how whole body health and whole choice health is critical to our individual and community health. Today's guest, Dr. Swathi Varanasi, is an Integrative Health Pharmacist committed to leveling up how we take care of ourselves and how we think about health care solutions. Additionally she's an entrepreneur, speaker, author, and a woman who is constantly asking, can we do this better and why not me? In her roles as Chief Scientific Officer at Element Apothec, Medical Communications at Everly Health, and Director of Science at Los Angeles NORML.
Hi! I'm so happy you're here! Today I'm interviewing my friend, Dr. Swathi Varanasi. Dr. Swathi Varanasi, or Dr. Swathi for short, is an award-winning bilingual pharmacist specializing in integrative health and botanical medicine. She is a plant-based wellness expert; a medical consultant for CBD, adaptogen, and health food brands; a published clinical researcher; an advocacy non-profit board of director; a multimedia content contributor; and a matcha enthusiast. Emphasizing an innovative and evidence-based approach, Dr. Swathi is passionate about educating practitioners, students, and patients on natural medicines, and empowering everyone to be the best, most authentic version of themselves.Contact Dr. Swathi:IG: www.instagram.com/doctorswathiwww.doctorswathi.comPrevious Episodes with Dr. Swathi Veranasi: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coffee-and-tea-with-carrievee/id1514671446?i=1000516941097https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coffee-and-tea-with-carrievee/id1514671446?i=1000506749334Book CarrieVee for a Speaking Engagement: https://www.coachcarriev.com/contact-meRadical Empowerment Method Book on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3Bdp2BCContact CarrieVee!IG: @iamcarrieveeLI and FB: Carrie Verrocchioemail: carriev@coachcarriev.com
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