January/February 2012 Winter Double Feature
Vinay Prasad, MD and Nancy Ho, MD
• Frequent teaching award winners - 12 between them!
• Dating since medical school, getting married in April, honeymooning in Hawaii
• Have collaborated professionally as well, writing several papers together
• Preparing to move to the Baltimore/ Washington, DC area for fellowship
Tell us a bit about your background:
Vinay: I grew up around the midwest, but my family has lived outside of Chicago, near the Michigan/Indiana border, for the last 15 years or so. I did my undergraduate at Michigan State University, and medical school at the University of Chicago.
Nancy: I grew up in Naperville, and spent a year living in Shanghai in the late 1990s. I did my undergrad, medical school and residency all at Northwestern.
Why did you choose internal medicine?
Vinay: I picked internal medicine because I like teasing out the most important part of a patient’s care and focusing on that; for someone, it might be their heart failure, for another, breast cancer. Because internal medicine covers so much, we can prioritize.
Nancy: I liked the number of options in internal medicine. Specializing or not. Whether or not to do procedures. I probably always suspected I’d specialize in GI, but I enjoyed my internal medicine years and learned a lot!
Where can we find you after hours?
N & V: We both enjoy riding our bikes on lakeshore path, and concerts in Millennium Park. Chicago in the summer is fantastic. When it comes to dining out, we often go for great ethnic food --- Ethiopean (Demera), Korean (Sunsugapsan / Kafe Korea), Middle Eastern (Pita Inn, Cedars), Thai (Sticky Rice) and Indian (Udupi palace) -- are some of our favorite restaurants. But, statistically, you are most likely to find us watching movies after work!
What are your plans for next year?
N&V: We are so excited to have managed to couples match for fellowship in a very competitive season!
Nancy: I am going to the University of Maryland-National Institutes of Health combined program in gastroenterology. I will spend a year in Baltimore, and then two more at the National Institutes of Health, in Bethesda, MD. I have been interested in GI for many years now, as it is a nice balance between clinic and procedures, and I’ve always been interested in nutrition and the healthy diet. I am looking forward to my time at the NIH and doing research on nutrition.
Vinay: I will be doing my fellowship in medical oncology at the National Institutes of Health. I was always interested by the specialties in medicine with robust evidence bases -- cardiology, oncology and critical care -- and ultimately made my choice based on the ability to balance clinical medicine with the research I want to do.
