The Neurotransmitters: Clinical Neurology Education

NeurAnki with Dr. Idha Sood

• Episode 51

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Dr. Idha Sood joins us today to talk about NeurAnki.

What is Anki? For the uninitiated, it is "a free and open-source flashcard program. It uses techniques from cognitive science such as active recall testing and spaced repetition to aid the user in memorization."

Idha talks with us about the process of undertaking a project of this magnitude and the management challenges that came along with it. 

Learn more about NeurAnki here

You can find Dr. Idha Sood on X/Twitter here.

& so much more
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Michael Kentris:

Hello and welcome back to the Neurotransmitters. I am so happy you could join us today. I'm your host, Dr Michael Kentris, and today we are talking about studying neurology, like we always do, but with an extra special twist. I am joined today by Dr Itha Sood Itha, thank you so much for joining me today.

Idha Sood:

Thank you, Dr Kentris. That was an amazing introduction.

Michael Kentris:

Thank you, I'm really. I'm at the end of my clinic day and I have to project excessive energy, so so thank you. It is projecting well, so you know we've been working together on a project, but in reality you are the driving force behind this project of NeurAnki, or however you care to pronounce it. So tell me first of all, for those who aren't familiar, what is Anki and why do we care?

Idha Sood:

Okay, so Anki is a flashcard-based software that was actually created initially to learn languages and then, maybe a billion years ago, someone in med school thought, hey, I'm tired of reading books and I'd like to actively learn using flashcards.

Idha Sood:

So they created this deck called the Anking, which is very popular among med students, and that's what they use in med school to study for their MLE examinations, what they use in med school to study for their MLE examinations, and which is what I used to study for my MLE examinations. And then I was done with like my rotations and the math season was starting and I was basically kind of jobless and I'm someone who needs to like work on something or have a side project always to be excited about, and I just wanted I just got a little bit curious, thinking, oh, let me just check out the deck for neurology residents, because obviously a billion years ago someone would have had an idea to create it for neurology residents, like a med student did. And then I could not find one, and and that's when I was like, okay, maybe this is something that people might be interested in. And that's how the idea or the concept of Neuranki, which is how I pronounce it was born.

Michael Kentris:

Well, I have no idea, so I'm certainly not going to correct you.

Idha Sood:

Yeah, it's, a lot of people like to call it Neuranki. And then the other day I was just thinking why did I just not keep it simple and call it Neuro Anki? But no, I had to add my flair to it and it's Neuro Anki Officially. It's Neuro Anki, but whatever.

Michael Kentris:

It's your brainchild, you get to call it whatever you want.

Idha Sood:

Yeah.

Michael Kentris:

So pretty big undertaking. So how did you kind of frame out the project?

Idha Sood:

pretty big undertaking. So how did you kind of frame out the project? Well, the story starts with you. I had absolutely no idea about what resources neurology residents use to study for their right or board examinations. I didn't even know there was something called a right examination when I first thought of creating Neuronkey and, like I said, I was at home bored, just thinking about what to do next.

Idha Sood:

And when I thought about this, I remembered that I had seen you pop up on my Twitter feed excessively, wow, excessively Healthy, limit of excessively. And I knew healthy, healthy, limit of excessively. And then, um, I knew that you were into medical education. Um, so I decided I might like reach out to you, hoping that you would say yes, of course, we'll do it, which is what you did. So, thank, thank you for that, because you really like to say, oh, I didn't do much. But truthfully, if you at that time had been like you know what, this might be a little too difficult and I do not know if we'll be able to do it then I might have just not gone through with it. So take credit where it's due, dr Kentress.

Michael Kentris:

It's very kind of you to say so. I'm happy to have been your encouraging behind the scenes person.

Idha Sood:

Well, and then when you finally agreed, I just thought, yeah, if I can just get like five people to sit with me and like create this, this would be great, to sit with me and like create this, this would be great. And that's when I decided to make that google form, which we both discussed and we both worked on, and we released it. And I was actually, I mean, happy is not it's too, um, easier word like I don't know the response that I got, which was like, I think, 300 or 400 responses within like a week.

Michael Kentris:

That's crazy.

Idha Sood:

That's when I knew that, okay, people are interested.

Idha Sood:

Definitely this is something that people want. So it was not me just thinking about it, bored like one day, which it was, but it was not me just thinking about it, bored like one day, which it was, but it was not something that was completely useless, you know. So this is something that people are interested in. And that's when I realized, okay, so how many people would actually be interested in working on it? Because a lot of people said that, yeah, we'd want to use it, but I still didn't know how many people would actually want to work on it, because that's where the commitment comes in and that's where sometimes, the schedules it might not match up. So again, it was like, okay, people understood, but how do I create this? And then again, I just wanted 10 people, but no, a lot of people were interested in contributing for it as well. Um, and the challenge became now trying to create a team of people, of way too many people, um, dividing them up, um, and these people were from not only like different parts of us, they're from different parts of the world with like very widely different time zones. So I was just thinking, oh my god, how do I divide people up according to the subspecialty that they are interested in contributing to, into a team with people who they'll work well with, since I didn't know anybody? And how can I make sure that we, although we have too many people, how can I make sure that people are contributing meaningfully enough to create like a set number of cards, so that they do feel that it's not just five minutes of their time that they have contributed and they've created something that they're you know, eight to nine months down the line, would be happy to say that they were a part of? So that was the second time when I reached out to you, when I was like this is a mess, this is way too many people and there's a lot of overlap. I do not know how to do this. And that's when you told me okay, let's just create an excel sheet, let's start from there.

Idha Sood:

So I remember it took me like three or four hours to sort through um, my responses on the google form and put people under the specialties and then see, okay, how many people are overlapping and where can I? How do I divide the teams? And that's when I realized, yep, I can't do this alone, I'm going to need some other leaders to sort of come and help me out. That's when we decided to create the co leaders or the core team heads for each subspecialty. So then I had to roll out another Google form. So I kind of increased my workload there and, sure, the same as the previous Google form.

Idha Sood:

I got like pretty nice responses and this time I stopped at like 20 responses. I was like, okay, this is it, like no more accepting responses. And then I talked to a few people. I have had certain leadership experiences before Neerangi which sort of helped me decide who would be good to work with. So I did end up talking to certain people just on text, asking what their time schedule is going to be like, how much will they be able to contribute, how many people will they be comfortable managing? And that's when I had my core team leaders. Once that was set, I was a little, I took like a little breath. And that's when I divided up the teams and I was expecting attrition. I knew that a lot of people would want to sign up. But then you know, because of their work schedules or because of the different time zones, I was pretty sure that a lot of people are going to will not be able to fulfill their commitments because excitement only lasts so long, which which which, which was which was so.

Idha Sood:

I was able to foresee that and that came in handy because I put in a lot of people in in in the in each respective subspecialty team and then, as I predicted, quite many of them sort of left as well. But then that is why I had kept the first Google form open and new people kept on signing up, so I would keep on going back to my Google form. See, okay, now I have like 50 more responses. Okay, how many people interested in contributing? Pick them up, put them in the subspecialty teams. And that is how we got.

Idha Sood:

We had like this uh, waterfall approach to workload where, okay, three people have not been responding to the core team leader. They come to me being like I don't have members and I just add new people, and that is how we sort of made sure that at least the workflow is not encrypted, even with people dropping out. And that is how we sort of like created the whole team and in the end we got our list of contributors which we released on social media. Thank you to each and every one of you who finally stuck. I think I counted it was like around 70 people by the end of it, out of 900 people that signed up.

Michael Kentris:

That's almost 10% right.

Idha Sood:

Almost 10%. Yeah, so these were the ones who, in the end, not just contributed to their own subspecialty of choice, but they also like whenever I needed, whenever one subspecialty was struggling. I had a few people who were like super contributors, if you would, if that's the correct term for them. I did make a Twitter post for like special mentions for them. These were just like five, six people who were there to sort of step in whenever needed, and we did all of this on a platform called Slack, which, again, I think I got to know because of the neurotransmitters. I didn't know Slack existed before that. So, yeah, we were able to, because if I had to email each and every person, I would have like gone crazy. So I'm glad that Slack exists and we used it, and that is how sort of our whole team came together.

Michael Kentris:

Excellent, yeah, no, that is a lot of work. And you know, I do want to point out, right, you took what? About 10 months it was less than a year to get this whole project from idea to launch. Is that correct? Yes, which is impressive. Let's just say that Now, obviously, this is a study tool for medical trainees, right? So a certain level of accuracy needed to be there, right? Because we're talking about volunteers, which are mostly other medical students, maybe even pre-med some people, and maybe some medical residents or residents of various stages of training. Does that sum it up pretty well?

Idha Sood:

Yes.

Michael Kentris:

So you needed some fact checkers? Yes, so tell me about how you built a team of fact checkers.

Idha Sood:

Yeah, that was the most interesting part and I just like skipped through it when I was talking about how I created it. Thank you for asking that question. So, um, um. So initially I had not thought about faculty reviewers at all. Um, you were part of the project and I was like, okay, I have like one board certified neurologist, like as the face of it, and that's fine.

Idha Sood:

I was not thinking about reviewing, getting it reviewed at all, because I do not think Anking the deck which is used for medical students. I don't think they used any faculty reviewers, so that idea had not crossed my mind till it was actually Dr Marawar who reached out to you saying this sounds like a nice idea and I'm ready to get on board. And that's when I was like, oh wait, if we have like epilepsy people, then maybe other people would be, you know, interested as well. And because I was like semi stalkerish, active on Twitter, I knew, like the neurologists who are big on medical education and that's when I reached out to Dr Christie for pediatric neurology and Dr Saylor for infectious diseases and these were my first two sort of people I knew who might say yes, and both of them did. And then it just started growing from there, and then I just had to ask, like all of you, oh so, do you have any recommendations for, let's say, vascular neurology or a reviewer for neuromuscular? So that's when all of you sort of helped me build those connections. I know you sent the email to, or you told me to send an email to, dr Esteban, who was the author of the book that we have used to create this deck, and when he got on board, that's when I was like, fully satisfied, that's when I was. I was not worried about, like quality at all, because I knew when the author is on board Now, now, now we're not going to have any issues and he brought up a very interesting point, which was that, okay, now that you are creating this and now that you have all these faculty guides on board, you want to make sure there are no copyright issues, which, again, was something that I had not thought about at all, because when we create our cards, we just copy paste from our resources, but that's for, like personal use.

Idha Sood:

Now, this was something that I was creating for like mass use and, yes, then the problem of copyright could have come up and, like I'm already very scared about the american legal system. I did not want to get sued for anything. So, um, that's when I realized, okay, it's good that I have such a huge team, because this is going to need paraphrasing rather than just like simple copy pasting. And then we used only open source images from like Radiopedia or open source journals, open access journals that allow you to use the images, provided it's not for any monetary benefit.

Idha Sood:

That's how we sort of created a deck, not only just with simple text but also pictures, and then got it verified from our faculty reviewers, who were who I'm I'm I'm just so thankful for, because I mean, now that I have started residency, I have zero time and these all the faculty guys are like very active in medical education and they have their own projects going on and they have to mentor residents and they have to see patients. But they came up like, but they agreed to be on board with this. So I'm very thankful to each and every faculty reviewer and everybody like replied to all the emails that I sent. So I did not feel neglected at all. I felt very supportive doing all of this, so it kept me going. And, yeah, we had this whole deck come through which met certain quality standards, so that we can tell our users that you can use it without being without questioning whether it is factually correct or not.

Michael Kentris:

Yes, high quality neurology education is our mantra here on the neurotransmitters, so it is important to note right. You know things will change in terms of the latest evidence, latest guidelines, so there will be some things that may drift out of date. So be aware of that as time goes on. But you've had a lot of interaction with people already using it because it's been out what two weeks now as of this recording?

Idha Sood:

I think so. Wow, it has been two weeks.

Michael Kentris:

Yes, Approximately, approximately. So what's the feedback you've gotten so far?

Idha Sood:

I think I've been on cloud nine since launch day. A lot of people downloaded it. I think the first day we had around 800 downloads and then we crossed 1000 downloads by day two and as of today, as told by you, I think, we are more than 1600 downloads, which is crazy, crazy good.

Michael Kentris:

Yes, as of checking my email before we started recording 1,660 is the current tally.

Idha Sood:

Clap, clap, clap.

Michael Kentris:

Yes, Congratulations to you. And you and so, in addition to I'm sorry, go ahead, go ahead. You're going to tell me more about Beyond Cloud 9.

Idha Sood:

I'm good with that. But the thing that I wanted to mention was that I was petrified on launch day because, I mean, even though I knew that it's good, I still was scared about the feedback and whether, like, I missed something and whether the quality was as good as I hoped. Because my job throughout the process was more like coordination and people management and meeting deadlines and literally motivating people to like make cards and finish on time, and taking cards from the team and the core heads and bringing them to the faculty and just my whole job was like managerial. So I never ended up creating a card, like I did for a few decks where I had to step in. So I knew that that portion is going to be great.

Idha Sood:

But, as a type A personality who is, like, very detail oriented, I was petrified that you know what? I have not seen each and every single card that has been made and oh my God, what's going to happen. So I was very happy that people liked it. I think when they downloaded it and just at first glance for them it looked great. I've had a few people reach out to me saying that it looks amazing, and I've had people reach out to me saying now they want to create one for psychiatry and like other um specialties as well. Good luck to you. I'm not gonna do that again.

Idha Sood:

It was an amazing, but it was. It was an amazing experience, but it was like time consuming and my life had become muranki um. I did not care about my residency interviews at all during this whole time. So if, if, if, other people want to like go ahead and create texts for their own subspecialties, please go ahead. Just know that it's going to be um quite a bit of time commitment and you're going to lose all sense of night and day and you're going to be like talking to a bit of time commitment and you're going to lose all sense of night and day and you're going to be like talking to a lot of people. So, if you're an introvert who kind of like loses energy talking to people, just make sure you have like a good team supporting you. That's all.

Michael Kentris:

I definitely put myself in that camp, to be honest. So, yeah, it's been great. Now, obviously, us us being interested in medical education we have taken this opportunity not just to create a useful study resource but to do some medical scholarship ourselves.

Idha Sood:

So tell me a little bit about the survey that's been developed and what that all entails so I think, as new rankings started every, whenever, whenever the next path or the next phase of creating it or working on it would become clear, I would have like another step added to it for the future. So, before the launch itself, like when it was close to the launch, and when I had, like when I was done creating the cards and when it was being reviewed, I did have this idea about okay, now I want to see whether it's useful or not. Yeah, people are going to use it, but is it going to help them? So that is when me and a few people that I worked with in Noranki and I'm going to name drop here because they've been amazing, so that's Zainab, jake Sossman and Caleb Manan. These were people who worked with me in Nooranki. These were the one of the special mentions that I would just like email them. Hey, I need help with this section, can you work on it? And they were just like always there. Need help with this section, can you work on it? And they were just like always there. So, um, I reached out to them and it was one zoom call where I was like I have this idea for a research project because I want to see that now we are creating this, but does it actually help neurology residents improve upon their write scores? Um, are they going to use it more than, like, let's say, sitting and reading a textbook? Because I know, know, in residency it's different from med school. You learn a lot while on the job. You learn a lot seeing patients. You learn from your attendings. You sort of learn from up to date. So there are all these other resources as well. Where does exactly Neuranki fit in and will it be something that would contribute to their right scores improving?

Idha Sood:

So we have planned a study, which is a part of it. A small part of it was the pre-use survey that we released on launch day with our deck and thankfully we've got 600 plus responses on that. I haven't checked it today. It might be more, but from the last time I checked it it has been like around 600 responses. So thank you to each and every one who filled out that survey, because that was not mandatory, that was volunteer only. So I'm really thankful to everyone who filled out the survey. We're going to be using that and that's going to be a part of us knowing whether we meet the expectations of the user 10 months down the line, when you've used it, when you've taken an end right examination and when you can tell us how you feel about it now. Will you continue to use it for the next year or will you throw it away? I hope you don't throw it away. I hope you use it for the next year as well. Um, but that's, that's the basic um idea behind the next phase of nirangi, which is just like studying whether it is useful and um.

Idha Sood:

Another uh thing that I would like to mention is that I've gotten a lot of queries about how it's going to be updated. How can we make sure that latest information is in there? So, first of all, neuranki is also editable in the sense that we did create a lot of fields so that residents can personalize their deck, including lecture notes. So whenever you go on to your didactics, you have your attendings or you have your peers give presentations with the latest information One, you can add them directly to your cards, so you can add as many images as you want. If you read a journal, if you read a paper about a topic that you came across in clinics and you want to add information from that, you can add that also to your deck. Plus, we will be releasing Neuranki very soon on Anki Hub, which is a software.

Idha Sood:

I don't think it's exactly free, but it's not very expensive and when we put it on there there are certain moderators that kind of make sure that the deck is updated. Anybody from any part of the world using the deck can give suggestions as they're using it, and if they come across a card that they feel is not quite correct and that needs to be changed, or new information has come up that can be added to the card. That's when people can make suggestions and the moderator on Anki hub takes care of everything. So that way I don't have to worry about it. You don't have to worry about it. It gets updated every day and you can. You can download. If someone is using it say next year we have a new pgy2 neurology resident who wants to start using your anki then you can download it from anki hub with up-to-date information, not worrying about learning information that's not quite accurate. So we do have a plan and we're gonna do it. Just like give me 10 minutes to breathe, that's all.

Michael Kentris:

Yes, and it will be very interesting to see how, how people do, how the long-term reception of it as a study tool is right, cause it does use a lot of those evidence-based learning techniques, uh, like space repetition and uh God, what's the other big buzzword? Thank you, yes. See, that's the opposite of what we did just now.

Idha Sood:

Yes.

Michael Kentris:

But yes, so it does. And those are kind of, I think, two of the best, most robust things for learning information and committing it to long-term memory. So I think I'm cautiously optimistic about what we'll see in terms of performance for people's in-service training exams and potentially even the board exams. So it should be pretty cool, and one of the things I really like is that it does have you know. You mentioned earlier, like all these different subspecialty categories like neuromuscular and epilepsy, and neuroinfectious and autonomics, and on and on and on, and you know some of these, like the child neurology section in particular. I remember when I was a resident, I was hitting several chapters just over and over and over again, child neurology being one of those and neuro-oncology being the other. But I was just reading those chapters over and over again because there's so much minutiae that you have to know for your board exams, and I think that this is the kind of tool that will really help cement some of that information in your memory.

Idha Sood:

I agree, I cannot learn the names of genes and proteins and which stain for which tumor. I don't get that. I'm going to use Nooranki for that. Yes, yeah, that was my issue with just passive reading as well. And, like I said once, I think once you go the Anki way, it's very hard to return. Once you start learning by either solving questions or using flashcards, it is impossible to go back to passive reading, and in my med school we, our exams, were a different format altogether, so we had to read and then we had to, like, write long paragraphs. That that's the way I used to study and I can never go back because of Anki Hence. Hence Neuranki was created, because I cannot go back to that. So, yeah, it does use spaced repetition and active recall, and we have created it so that people can continue to use these techniques beyond their med school for residency as well, and I just hope that it ends up being used as much as I want it to.

Michael Kentris:

Yeah, I think. Well, if the initial numbers are anything, then I think, there's a very good chance, right, if we think about how many neurology residencies there are in the country and how many times it's already been downloaded. Yeah, I did not think about it like that I think it was like 120, 130, something around there neurology residencies. So it's been downloaded 1600 times already.

Idha Sood:

Oh wow, okay, that's great.

Michael Kentris:

Right, you're probably fairly notorious at this point.

Idha Sood:

Yeah.

Michael Kentris:

So it's very exciting Now you're actually going to be presenting some of our initial data coming up at some conferences in the near future.

Idha Sood:

Yes, so Neeranki is coming to AN, which is happening in um, orlando next week. Is it next week? Yes, it is next week. Yes, I have to create a poster for that. I haven't done it. Um, so, um, this, uh, uh. This poster is just going to be about um, the initial.

Idha Sood:

So this is based on the Google form that I released the first time asking people if they think that something like this can be used by neurology residents. Will Neurankya as a tool be something that they would be interested in? Will it fit their schedules? Do they feel that they'll be able to use it long term and be more consistent with it, rather than the current study resources that they use? And we had a lot of like. I said, I had almost 900 responses in total on that, so I'm going to be presenting that data at ANA and I have other plans as well for, hopefully, aan in like the next year as far as Neeranki is concerned.

Idha Sood:

So if anyone who's interested, please come to my poster. It's on Sunday, september 15th. I'd love to meet you. I'd love to talk to you more about it and also the study that we are planning, which is the prospective study to see whether NIRANKI has any effect on NRIGHT scores. Please come talk to me about that as well. We would love to enroll you and we would love to sort of like what is the idiom? What is the saying? Put my money where my mouth is. Is that the saying?

Michael Kentris:

Yes, I believe you have it, we would love to do that. Now the thing that is, I think, most impressive is you did all of this as a medical student, right? You're currently in your intern year.

Idha Sood:

Yes.

Michael Kentris:

You have basically built a nationwide slash international coalition to build this study resource.

Idha Sood:

Yes.

Michael Kentris:

How does that make you feel?

Idha Sood:

I mean to the point, when you put it into words, I don't think about it like that. And then you start saying these things and I get uncomfortable. And then you start saying these things and I get uncomfortable. That's how I feel. Yeah, I was, I had graduated Technically. I was a medical graduate.

Michael Kentris:

But yeah, same as like a medical student just out of med school In limbo.

Idha Sood:

In limbo, yes, in the in between state. It did, it did. It did take a lot of my energy. Now that I look at it, because by the time launch day came, I was done. I was like I can't anymore, and I think that happens when you've put like a lot of energy and a lot of time into it. So, yes, I'm happy that, like, I have made certain friends through it and I've made certain connections, certain people that I know. If I have any future projects, I'm going to be reaching out to them because they have been proven to be like trustworthy and reliable. Um, I'm great Niranji gave me that.

Idha Sood:

Um, I'm also happy. I mean, yeah, if you think about it like there's someone working in, like I had people from every continent except Antarctica, I think. Um, I know I had people from, uh, brazil, many, many people from US, india, Pakistan, um, a lot of countries in Europe as well, georgia. I think my geography improved so much when I looked up where people were joining me from. So I'm really glad that this is, yes, like, not just like a resource which can be internationally used, but also like internationally created, like for the people, by the people.

Michael Kentris:

So if you had to talk to, let's say, ida from a year ago and give her any advice, to speak to the you you know the pre-residency you and give them advice on starting a project that is this widespread, what kind of recommendations would you have for you?

Idha Sood:

Where do you come up with these questions, dr Kentris? That was very creative. I'm actually pretty happy with the past Idha and how she handled things and I think that's because I had, like, other leadership experiences before that in which I learned a lot. So those were the experiences that I mishandled so that Neeranki was handled well. So that Neeranki was handled well, I would just say the only advice that I would give the previous idha which I still give this idha but I never follow is to like take a break day, like a scheduled break day, once a week when you do not think about the thing that you're actively working on, which I still struggle with.

Idha Sood:

And sometimes, when I take a break day, it's not.

Idha Sood:

It's not really a break day because I keep on procrastinating rather than like I would do other things, I would not work on it but still be at the back of my mind, and then the break day would end but I would not feel refreshed. So the one thing, the one advice that I would give the previous Siddha was just take the correct amount, the correct number of breakdays that you need, so that you don't crash and then, you know, go off the face of the earth for a week because you didn't schedule your breakdays in advance the correct way. So that's something like take it, take it a little easy, have some faith in yourself. Don't try not to be an extreme type a personality, um, try to delegate more. Um, I think I handled it pretty well, but yeah, I could have delegated it a little bit more so that it was um, not as much pressure on me. But but overall I think I'm pretty happy with the previous Hitha, like pat on the back, like we did it, we did it.

Michael Kentris:

It is very impressive, I will say I couldn't even conceive of you know past Michael doing something like this when he was just, you know, pre-residency. You know that guy had his hair on fire. But going forward, has this given you a taste for research in medical education? Or?

Idha Sood:

are there more arenas that you wish to explore? So, yes, I think it has given me taste for medical education, but more than that, I feel my interest lies in leadership and projects like heading projects. I think I worked really well with people this time, probably because we were all neurologists and like, yeah, we rock. I think it was so much easier to like deal with people who were interested in neurology, passionate about neurology. I didn't have to force anybody to do anything, which has not been my past leadership experience, which is why this was just like great.

Idha Sood:

The whole 10 months was just positive.

Idha Sood:

I never had one uncomfortable interaction with anybody and even when I had to like let a few people go, it was because of mutual understanding that they were not able to meet the demands that was required of them, which was understandable because of whatever stage that they were in, be it medical student or in limbo, like me, like I was, or as a resident. So I feel I feel that's where I would love like after a good number, a good number of days of break, not right now, but I would love to like conceive of something that that is useful on a large scale. I think that's where my interests lie. Even if I get into research for medical education or, let's say, any other subspecialty focused research, my interests always lie in something that can be widely applied and that's some and something that is useful. So it's still very broad as far as future prospects are concerned. But I know leadership is one area that I feel very comfortable with that I want to explore more and that's the path that I want to take and grow in.

Michael Kentris:

Better be careful or you'll wind up. Chief resident.

Idha Sood:

I'm a baby intern right now.

Michael Kentris:

It's only a few years away.

Idha Sood:

We'll see.

Michael Kentris:

This has been a fun conversation. I'm very excited that you have crossed the finish line on this project. It is incredibly impressive and I also am looking forward to seeing how it performs now that it's out in the real world. And if people want to find the resources that you've made, if they want to get in touch with you, where should they find you online?

Idha Sood:

Do they really want to get in touch with me?

Michael Kentris:

Okay, If you want, we don't have to tell them. They can do it on their own.

Idha Sood:

Yeah, so well, jokes aside, yes, you can get in touch with me, for sure, um, I think the best place would be twitter, because that's where, um, that's the social media that, like, I end up opening up the most, because that's like purely and purely academic based. There is no personal. There is some personal um photographs or some personal information out there, um, that people put on twitter, but mostly it's just like academic based and that's where, like, the whole neurology community is, especially the ones interested in education. So, if you want to reach out to me, of course you can. You can text me on Twitter. You can also email me. I think, by this point, everything is like out on Google, so there's a lot of ways to reach me, but Twitter is the best way.

Idha Sood:

I do encourage other people if they want to create something like this for their own subspecialties, please go ahead and do it and let me know how the process goes for you, um, I hope it's not as long as it was for me, or I hope it goes as smoothly as it did for me. Um, so, yes, you can. You can reach out me If you want to participate, if you're a resident and you want to participate in the study that we're going to do to see whether Uranki is useful for in-write examinations. Then please reach out to me, whether it's Twitter or email or any form of social media that you're comfortable with. I'm everywhere.

Michael Kentris:

What's your handle out there, by the way?

Idha Sood:

Oh, yeah, my oh. Now I feel embarrassed. My handle is Joyful Astrocyte and that's just because my name means joy. And well, everyone is a neuron, so I just wanted to be like a supporting cell. So that's why I'm a joyful astrocyte on Twitter. So please, please, do reach out to me.

Michael Kentris:

Excellent, excellent. And until we get the files migrated over, you can still find it on the neurotransmitterscom, I believe, slash neuroanky and we'll still have a link going forward to wherever we end up migrating it permanently. So we'll keep that online there. And of course, you can also find me on Twitter, slash X at Dr Kentris D-R-K-E-N-T-R-I-S. Not as creative.

Idha Sood:

We need to change. I was about to say we need to change your Twitter handle now.

Michael Kentris:

I like that. You know yours has like oh, I'm happy, I'm joyful, I'm an astrocyte, I'm supporting all of my fellow neurons. Yours has layers, mine's just my name.

Idha Sood:

So much more creative. We balance each other.

Michael Kentris:

You know nothing flashy about it, so always a pleasure talking with you. We'll put links to all the stuff in the show notes for today and we'll get this out before you're showing up at ANA so that hopefully you get bombarded by neurology residents and other faculty interested in your project.

Idha Sood:

Thank you. Thank you, Dr Kentress.

Michael Kentris:

All right, you take care.

Idha Sood:

Okay, you too.

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Michael Kentris

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