Spring's in full bloom, and we have so many new buds opening up that we're excited to share with you, our phenomenal community of public health educators.

This post marks a sneak peek we're sharing just with our subscribers: we've been breathing new life into our website, including a pivot to a broader approach to our Detailing Strategy and a whole new set of Expert Consultation Services. Come take a peek!

All of this newness is being officially unveiled on June 25th at our Annual Summit: 1 Day Implementation Intensive! It's a full day of interactive virtual workshops, and you're all cordially invited to join us and re-energize yourselves, kick your morale up a notch or three, and meet people who share your values, goals, and desire to ignite behavior change and share the best evidence-based information with the healthcare community.

To show you how much we care about reinvigorating our community, leave a comment below about your hopes for the future of public health between now and Wednesday, May 20th @ 5 p.m. and get your $399.00 Summit Registration for FREE. (We'll approve your comment and reach out with a registration code.)

Keep fighting the good fight, and we'll see you next month!

In gratitude,
Bevin Amira & The NaRCAD Team

Host: Anna Morgan-Barsamian, MPH, RN, PMP, Senior Manager, Training & Education, NaRCAD

A conversation with Susan Fithen, MSW, LSW, OCPSA, Senior Community Outreach Coordinator, Hamilton County Public Health
​​
Tag: Podcast Series, ​Opioid Safety

What if the conversations we have with students today could shape the care patients receive tomorrow?

In this episode, we explore a creative adaptation of clinician outreach education—bringing the academic detailing model into the classroom to reach future clinicians before they enter practice. Through open, real-world conversations about overdose prevention, stigma, and patient-centered care, students begin building skills and perspectives they’ll carry into the field.

Tune in to unpack the opportunities and challenges of this approach, including measuring long-term impact, maintaining connections over time, and tailoring content across disciplines to meet the needs of medical, nursing, and pharmacy students.

If you would like to connect with Susan about her work, feel free to reach out to her at [email protected].

Click here for the audio transcription.


"We've taken a non-traditional [detailing] approach to reach out to students to
have conversations around overdose prevention, caring for people with use disorder,
​and improving outcomes for those that they will be serving."
-Susan Fithen, MSW, LSW, OCPSA
​

Biography. Susan Fithen is a Senior Community Outreach Coordinator at Hamilton County Public Health. In her role, she brings education and awareness of overdose prevention tools to the community. Prior to her work at HCPH, Susan was a substance use counselor working in adult treatment. She also has experience working with youth through school-based prevention. She has a bachelor’s degree in social work from the University of Cincinnati and received her master’s in social work from Northern Kentucky University.






​
Want more? Follow us on Spotify or Apple!

By April Hopcroft, Public Health Intern, NaRCAD

An interview with Amy McWeeney, Public Health Detailing Specialist, New Hampshire Department of Health & Human Services

Tags: Stigma, ​Hepatitis C

April: Hi Amy, and thanks for joining DETAILS today! I know you have quite an interesting professional path that brought you to the field of detailing. Could you tell me a little bit about your background and how you came to this work?
 
Amy: Absolutely. My profession is as a physical therapist - including as a clinician, director of rehab, a professor of PT, and a department chair. When the college I was teaching at closed due to COVID-19, I came across a vacant position in public health and started working for the State of New Hampshire in the Ryan White Program.
 
About a year later, an infectious disease Public Health Detailing Specialist position opened and I applied. The role of the Detailing Specialist is to collaboratively develop educational materials on infectious disease for healthcare professionals and provide in-person or virtual meetings to share these materials while identifying barriers to screening, diagnosis, linkage to care, and treatment.
 
This role seemed to match all the things I enjoy - as it offers opportunities to expand on my clinical, teaching, interpersonal, and networking skills. I remember thinking, “This sounds fabulous.” I’m now entering my fifth year at the state, and my fourth year in the Detailing Specialist role.
 
April: I can really sense your passion for building relationships and sharing knowledge with healthcare professionals. I first came across your work during an internship at New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services on viral hepatitis. I know at that time you were providing hepatitis C detailing visits and using comprehensive tools in a packet called an action kit. Could you share what an action kit is and what prompted you to focus on hepatitis C?
 
Amy: An action kit is essentially a toolkit of curated resources and best practices for healthcare professionals on a specific topic, such as viral hepatitis or sexually transmitted infections.
 
The hepatitis C action kit was very collaborative, which was different from our typical detailing projects. It came out of an identified need during a conversation with our Viral Hepatitis Program Coordinator, and we also had external development and printing support from a contracted consulting group. It’s encouraging to think about past success stories and to think about what can be achieved with partners and collaboration.

April: That’s inspiring to think about all we can achieve through collaboration. Could you walk me through the process of developing the hepatitis C action kit and the key messages you chose to include?
 
Amy: For this kit, we were lucky to have an internal Subject Matter Expert (SME) - the Viral Hepatitis Program Coordinator. The challenge was the SME had a wealth of knowledge and wanted to share it all. When you’re detailing, you can only focus on one to three key points - otherwise, you lose people during the conversation.
 
It’s a demanding time for healthcare professionals and staying up to date can be incredibly difficult. There’s a widely cited study showing it takes 17 years for medical research to be incorporated into practice after it’s published in journals. Given this reality, the challenge was deciding what the providers truly needed to know and narrowing down to a few key priority points which provided the most meaningful and actionable information.
 
Our main points were related to the CDC guideline recommending every adult be tested for hepatitis C at least once in their lifetime, since this was new information. I also wanted to highlight that sobriety is not required for a person to get hepatitis C treatment.
 
April: Prioritization is such a key part of detailing, especially since you often have limited time with healthcare professionals. Can you share a story you use depicting the potential impact of the education you provide?
 
Amy: Absolutely – I have a story I often share in my hepatitis C detailing visits that reflects the sobriety piece I mentioned previously. It’s about a patient who was living with HIV and was later diagnosed with hepatitis C. Unfortunately, their healthcare professional didn't offer hepatitis C treatment because the patient wasn't sober, and six months later, the patient passed away from hepatitis C. This is devastating given hepatitis C is curable.
 
It was important to me to share this story and reinforce people don't need to be sober to get treatment. They can get treatment, they should get treatment, and they deserve treatment.
 
April: What a powerful story – I know it will continue to resonate with me as an example of the types of gaps detailing seeks to fill. While this story is certainly discouraging, I’m energized by your commitment to countering these misconceptions and addressing all the different barriers that can prevent patients from getting the care they need. In that vein, I saw that you also included a lot of patient-facing cost resources in the hepatitis C action kit. What motivated you to include those?
 
Amy: I have always felt I’m sharing all this great clinical information, but what good is it if patients can't pay for their medication? I think a lot about how to “close the loop” so people can access care and treatment. That’s the end goal. 

​April: I love that you’re always thinking about “closing the loop” to ensure everyone has the full assistance they need to access care, whether via commercial patient-assistance programs, medication assistance funds, or other cost-sharing programs. I know you’ve included these financial resources in other action kits, too, such as the Tuberculosis action kit. I hope this will inspire other detailers to consider how they can “close the loop” for patients.
​
Let’s now turn to impact – can you share any findings on the outcomes of your detailing work?
 
Amy: Sure! Our Viral Hepatitis Epidemiologist analyzed the effect of detailing on formal reports of hepatitis C cases by healthcare professionals to the state. For context, hepatitis C is a reportable condition in New Hampshire, meaning healthcare professionals are required to report any cases within 72 hours of a new diagnosis. She found a significant increase in provider reports in the six months after we started detailing on hepatitis C, compared to the previous six months. This has broader implications for public health, such as developing rapport with local healthcare systems through detailing which may improve disease reporting.
 
April: Wow – that’s so neat the Viral Hepatitis Epi was able to analyze the impact of your detailing efforts. Let’s wrap up with a story from the field. Can you share an anecdote where you helped a clinician overcome a barrier to hepatitis C treatment?
 
Amy: Detailing is about creating strong relationships and developing trust with healthcare professionals. Often, barriers only become visible when you have open, honest conversations.
 
I remember one meeting with a pharmacy director about hepatitis C treatment. As we walked through the process of getting patients their medications, we realized she was completing extra insurance steps that weren’t needed. Those insurance requests were often denied, causing unnecessary delays.
 
To be able to say, “Okay, there's this simple, small thing we can do to fix this - you were doing these extra steps, and we can actually get rid of those” was so satisfying – not just for me, but for the clinician and, most importantly, for the patients. Thanks to this one educational moment, hundreds of people are now going to get the care they need.
 
Other times in my detailing sessions, I’ve met healthcare professionals who thought they needed to “watch and wait” for six months to see if acute hepatitis C would resolve on its own before starting patients on treatment. I made sure they knew treatment can start right away for anyone with an acute infection.
 
Seeing the ripple effect of these small changes is incredibly rewarding. I love this job because you get to see the positive impact on the community firsthand.
 
April: That’s great to have so many stories showing the impact of your detailing program. We’re looking forward to following the additional action kits you’re developing around tick-borne disease and sexually transmitted infections. Thanks for chatting with us today and sharing your experiences and passion, Amy!

Have thoughts on our DETAILS Blog posts? Leave a comment!  

Biography. Amy is a Public Health Detailing Specialist for the State of NH. In this role, she provides education to healthcare providers throughout the state around infectious disease. Amy researches, meets with subject matter experts, and creates materials for the detailing sessions. As a Physical Therapist for close to thirty years, she has had a robust career. Clinically, she has treated patients in a variety of environments, including outpatient with aquatics, inpatient rehabilitation, and geriatric care. Her leadership roles have included being a Director of Rehabilitation, Manager for Home Care & Hospice, a college Professor, and a college Department Chair teaching others physical therapy. Amy recently found a passion for Public Health in the Ryan White Care Program and was then promoted to her current role. 

Host: Anna Morgan-Barsamian, MPH, RN, PMP, Senior Manager, Training & Education, NaRCAD

A conversation with Brandon Mizroch, MD, MBBS, President & Founder, BrandaCorp Public Health Consulting

Tag: Podcast Series, Hepatitis C

What if curing a chronic disease was simpler than we thought?

Come chat with us as we explore how Louisiana’s bold approach to hepatitis C helped shift clinician perspectives, reduce stigma, and expand access to life-saving treatment.

From powerful patient stories to practical tools that made care feel doable, this discussion highlights how leading with hope, simplicity, and connection can drive meaningful change. Tune in to hear how one initiative helped cure nearly 20,000 people—and what others can learn from it.
​
If you would like to connect with Brandon about his hepatitis C work or public health detailing more broadly, feel free to reach out to him at [email protected].
​
Click here for the audio transcription.


​
"All of the other reportable infectious conditions combined weren't having as much of an impact as hepatitis C was having on our communities."
-Brandon Mizroch, MD, MBBS
​

Biography. Brandon attended medical school at the University of Queensland/Ochsner Health System joint degree program. After medical school he pivoted to work in public health with the Louisiana Department of Health where he spent the next six years overseeing the academic detailing program for the Office of STDs/HIV/HCV. After working with physicians all over the state of Louisiana focused on topics such as PrEP, PEP, syphilis prevention and treatment, and other infectious diseases, the office created the nation’s first state-level HCV elimination project.

He helped create the education program that trained over 800 clinicians in delivering HCV care, resulting in curing over 12,000 people living with HCV. In 2022 Brandon moved to Salt Lake City, Utah to oversee the academic detailing program for the Utah AIDS Education & Training Center where he worked to continue their mission of improving the health of Utah’s most vulnerable members. In 2025 he started his own Public Health Consulting Company in Washington DC to continue this work with jurisdictions around the country.
​

​Want more? Follow us on Spotify or Apple!

Communicating effectively with frontline clinicians takes a rare set of skills. Not only do you need to be able to translate complex clinical guidelines and recommendations succinctly and dynamically, you also need the interpersonal relationship-building skills that allow you to genuinely connect with doctors, nurses, and pharmacists who need customized support to implement new approaches.

Our close-knit community is comprised of the 1400 healthcare professionals we've trained to walk into clinics and hospitals and effect long-lasting, strategic change - whether that's convincing providers to use a new screening tool, prescribe a different medication, or start referring patients to behavioral health. ​​And because research shows that a human-to-human approach is much more likely to activate change than an email, memo, webinar, or lecture, that's what we teach.

​Using a proven communications structure, our trainees learn how to take motivational interviewing and add a twist - making a tangible "ask" at the end of the conversation. When this "detailing" approach is deployed effectively, clinician behaviors change, workflows improve, and patients get healthier.

​Join us this Spring for an intensive virtual training with high interactivity, a 5:1 student:teacher ratio, and an environment of encouragement, creativity, and dedication to improving patient health.

COMMENT BELOW & WIN!
​Be one of the first ten people to comment below about why you're
excited to be working in healthcare or public health and receive
​$400.00 OFF of your training registration!


​​See you online!
The NaRCAD Team

Host: Anna Morgan-Barsamian, MPH, RN, PMP, Senior Manager, Training & Education, NaRCAD

A conversation with La-Tricia Gordon, RN, CARN, Medical Education Specialist and Clement Chen, PharmD, BCPS, Clinical Pharmacist Specialist,  Rutgers Northern New Jersey MAT Center of Excellence

Tag: Podcast Series, Opioid Safety

How do we align and connect community efforts to support patients who use substances?

Join us as we discuss critical public health education to connect diverse stakeholders across complex systems, with the ultimate goal of caring for community members with substance use disorder. Whether these patients are residents, incarcerated, or reintegrating into the community, our guest speakers discuss successful, evidence-based programming to ensure the community is aligned in empowering patients to live healthier lives.

​A note from our guests: 
This quote is one they return to often, and it speaks to the importance of trust, relationships, and community woven throughout the conversation: 

“The opposite of addiction is not sobriety. The opposite of addiction is connection.”
- Johann Hari, Author & Journalist

Click here for the audio transcription.

Want more? Follow us on Spotify or Apple!

Host: Anna Morgan-Barsamian, MPH, RN, PMP, Senior Manager, Training & Education, NaRCAD

A conversation with Monica Roberts, PharmD, Academic Detailing Pharmacist, University of Kentucky

Tag: Podcast Series, Opioid Safety

Can a five-minute conversation really change health outcomes?

In this episode, Monica Roberts, PharmD, shares insights and successes from a public health education and outreach initiative focused on relationship-centered “mini visits” with community pharmacists, designed to reduce stigma and expand access to care for patients with opioid use disorder. Tune in and learn more about how small, well-timed conversations can strengthen pharmacist-patient interactions and translate evidence into action at the pharmacy counter.

Click here for the audio transcription.

"Having any bit of new information that you can bring [to a visit] really helps give you a hook. Anything that you can provide that's new to everybody, even the people that are already doing all the right things, that makes it a lot easier and gets a lot more engagement."
​-Monica Roberts, PharmD

​Biography. 

​Monica F. Roberts, PharmD, is an academic detailing pharmacist at the University of Kentucky. She developed and delivered the prescription opioid safety educational outreach program for the HEALing Communities Study in Kentucky and now works on several opioid-related projects at UK. Dr. Roberts has extensive experience working in community pharmacies. Prior to her pharmacy career, she worked in journalism and publishing.


​Want more? Follow us on Spotify or Apple!

Host: Anna Morgan-Barsamian, MPH, RN, PMP, Senior Manager, Training & Education, NaRCAD

A conversation with Finn Black, RN, MS and Rebecca Martinez, MS, RN, FNP-C, Center for Innovative Academic Detailing on Opioids & Stimulants (CIAO)
​
​Tag: Podcast Series, Opioid Safety

​What if access to medications for opioid use disorder didn’t have to start in a clinic?

​In this episode of Changing Minds, host Anna Morgan-Barsamian is joined by Finn Black and Rebecca Martinez from the Center for Innovative Academic Detailing on Opioids and Stimulants (CIAO). They discuss how academic detailing supported the rapid implementation of a telehealth and street-based initiative designed to expand access to buprenorphine for people who use opioids. The conversation highlights patient-centered program design, scalable clinician support, and key lessons for cities responding to urgent public health challenges.

Click here for the audio transcription.

Want more? Follow us on Spotify or Apple!

December, 2015
 
Dear colleagues,
          
Season’s greetings. Mentoring has always been an important value in our Division, and one reason our research has gone well is that members of our group nurture one another so effectively. I never really had a mentor of my own; the closest I came was a vicarious relationship with someone I never met, baseball star Yogi Berra, even though I have absolutely no interest in baseball. Berra died earlier this year [2015], and upon his death USA Today published a collection of his most famous quotations. His words can provide some perspective as we look back on our challenges and accomplishments of the past year, and look forward to our work in the next.
 
It's not widely known, but Berra made several keen observations about epidemiology and the documentation of clinical choices:

“You can observe a lot by just watching.”
 
“If I hadn't believed it, I wouldn't have seen it!”
 
He warned us of the need to be cautious about projecting our findings onto new  outcomes, a problem I've previously described as "premature extrapolation":

"It's hard to make predictions, especially about the future.”
 
But to be fair, like too many of us he wasn’t always so precise in his quantitative analysis:

"Baseball is 90% mental and the other half is physical.”
 
"You better cut the pizza in four pieces, because I'm not hungry enough to eat six.”
 
Yogi liked to reminisce about his early career, reminding me of the initial days of our own programs before academic detailing and pharmaco-epidemiology were respected fields, and before we had so many talented collaborators:
 
[on the 1973 Mets]: “We were overwhelming underdogs … and we made too many wrong mistakes.”
 
A fine group of smart young people joined our programs when they were just starting out, including NaRCAD’s Mike Fischer. Each year, more and more bright newcomers join our movement:

"It's like déjà vu all over again.”
 
So that now,

“We have deep depth.”

Our programs have brought together physicians, pharmacists, nurses, other clinical professionals, epidemiologists, and health services researchers, among other disciplines. Some of you are two or three of these at the same time. Yogi could have been referring to many in the field when he said of one player,
 
"He hits from both sides of the plate. He's amphibious.”
 
Berra anticipated our interdisciplinary work groups when he told his players,

"Go and pair up in threes.”
 
In these difficult times for health care in general and for academic detailing in particular, it helps to remember this advice:
 
“Somebody's gotta win, somebody's gotta lose. Don't fight about it. Just try to get better.”
 
Many interdisciplinary groups have trouble making this work, as Yogi explained about one gathering he attended:

"It was impossible to get a conversation going, everybody was talking too much."
 
Today, our funding is harder to get, and budgets are more constrained than ever. In his words,

"A nickel ain't worth a dime anymore.”
 
We can get frustrated that it sometimes takes several tries to get much-needed support for our activities. So it helps to have this attitude:

"Slump? I ain't in no slump… I just ain't hitting.”
 
"I never blame myself when I'm not hitting; I just blame the bat. If it keeps up I change bats. After all, if it isn't my fault that I'm not hitting, I can't get mad at myself.”
 
He advised us to relax into our work:
 
"You don't have to swing hard to hit a home run. If you've got the timing, it'll go.”
 
And he offered perhaps the wisest insight for anyone in this line of work:
 
"You've got to be very careful if you don't know where you're going, because you might not get there.”
 
Berra also had good advice for those of us who are more senior:

"If you ask me anything I don't know, I'm not going to answer.”
 
And for those of us who are getting on in years, this suggestion:
 
"Always go to other people's funerals, otherwise they won't come to yours.”
 
There was this on being humble and not resting on your laurels:
 
"Even Napoleon had his Watergate.”
 
We all have our skills and our flaws, as Yogi understood:
 
"So I'm ugly. But I never saw anyone hit with his face.”
 
I should wrap up this short talk now. It's December, and the days are getting shorter, as he observed:

"It gets late early out here.”
 
Pharmacoepidemiology and academic detailing have come a long way from their first origins back in the 1980s. Now the field has many more participants… perhaps too much so! As Yogi said about a popular nightclub,
 
"No one goes there anymore, it's too crowded.”
 
We’re closing out a difficult year of 2015 and there’s no guarantee that the next one will be any easier:
 
"The future ain't what it used to be.”
 
But as we move together into the coming year, let’s remember one of Yogi's wisest and best-known aphorisms:

"When you get to a fork in the road, take it.”
 
That advice wasn’t as goofy as it sounded. I’m told he lived at the top of a hill, and the road to get to his house divided into two branches, both of which ended up at his door. So there was good advice there, both geographically and spiritually.

Finally, as Yogi said at a commemorative event to honor him,

"I'm a lucky guy and I'm happy to be with the Yankees. And I want to thank everyone for making this night necessary.”
 
As for me, I'm proud to have had the privilege of working with you all throughout 2015, and I look forward to the coming year, with all the ups and downs it will bring. As we confront the stresses of the moment, let’s remember one of Yogi’s most famous insights:
 
"It ain't over till it's over.”

December 2025 postscript : Striking a blow for evidence-based medicine:
 

NaRCAD and DoPE continue to work hard to improve prescription drug use, but suddenly those values seem to be drowning in chaos at the national level. I’ve tried to bring some sanity to these issues in my book “Rethinking Medications,” and will be donating a portion of its proceeds to charity. So I’m not embarrassed to ask you to consider giving it as a gift to family, friends, and colleagues. That could help spread a bit more understanding of how all of us – patients, clinicians, policymakers, regular citizens – can use science and not ideology to guide the way we regulate and use medical interventions. And it has a whole chapter on academic detailing: Chapter18, ‘Better Signals.’ More information is at www.RethinkMeds.info.

​Warm wishes for the holiday season, and for a healthy, fulfilling, and less deranged new year.  –Jerry A.

An interview with Christine Fishman, RPH, MPH, Academic Detailing Lead, MetroHealth

​This episode's guest speaker, Christine Fishman, RPH, MPH, Academic Detailing Lead, works at MetroHealth in Ohio, and she shares her insights about the ways in which knowledge, rapport, and service all help frontline clinicians to provide the best care for their patients who have substance use disorder.

Looking at the necessity for strong relationship-building within a hospital system, Chris discusses the critical importance of humbly admitting when you don't know the answer; showing up consistently for clinicians who are overwhelmed with the unique needs of patients struggling with SUD; and igniting practice transformation in the field of addiction medicine.

Chris shares insights about the key skills needed to make an impact in our field. Most importantly, she highlights the fact that being an expert in addiction medicine isn't the key characteristic of a successful detailer. Instead, it's understanding the challenges a clinician faces in terms of their clinic workflow; navigating gaps in resources or tools; and clinicians' needs for technology that makes it easier to identify vulnerable patients requiring specialized care or treatment. Perhaps most important of all is the key role a clinical educator plays in providing compassion, empathy, and encouragement as clinicians face daily stressors, both expected and unexpected.

Click here for the audio transcription.

Learn more about Christine's work at NaRCAD's June 2025 Summit Session: 
"Integrating Navigators into AD in the ER:
The SUN Program at MetroHealth to
Better Support Patients with Substance Use Disorder" 
Slide Deck PDF | Video Recording.

Biography.
Christine Fishman, RPH, MPH,  Academic Detailing Lead MetroHealth
Christine Fishman began her healthcare career in 1998 working as a pharmacist, serving patients in communities throughout Ohio and Michigan. She earned her Bachelor of Science in Pharmacy from the University of Toledo. While taking a break from her pharmacy practice to focus full time on raising her three children, she became increasingly alarmed by the worsening opioid crisis. Determined to be a part of the solution, she shifted her focus to serving the community and earned her master’s in public health from Kent State University in 2020. She was hired to pilot and lead the AD program at the MetroHealth System’s Office of Opioid Safety almost five years ago and is here to share insights and lessons learned. Christine is currently working to earn her PharmD from the Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University of Colorado.

An interview with Mike Fischer, MD, MS, Director & Founder, NaRCAD

When our community comes together, we get back to the essence of why we do the work we do: building trust with clinicians and their patients.

Join us as we chat about the magic of our annual international conference, with this year's 13th annual just around the corner.

You'll hear from our director and founder, Mike Fischer, about the importance of this annual event, a sneak peek of what's on the menu, and what the bottom line of good detailing and relationship-building is all about: trust. Stay tuned 'til the end for an opportunity to get free registration at this year's event.



"We have people from all different parts of the country [...] from city health departments, state health departments, private healthcare systems, nonprofit organizations that promote health topics, rural health departments...each of them is going to have a unique story to tell about how they do academic detailing." 

​Click here for the audio transcription.

When I was younger, I used to think "provenance" referred to a lovely part of southern France, or maybe to a divine presence that was watching over us all the time. Then I learned it actually means the source of something: a work of art, a book, perhaps an idea. And that such provenance has two key dimensions: how rigorous is the information on which it’s based, and who is trying to purvey that art or idea to a potentially unsuspecting customer.
 
For decades, my colleagues and I – at NaRCAD, Alosa, and throughout the global academic detailing community – have obsessed over issues of provenance in trying to develop the very best messages we could about the benefits and risks of medications: Where was that study published? Who did the work?  And by far the most important: How rigorous was its methodology?

Like-minded evidence synthesizers around the world would focus on confidence intervals, effect sizes, control groups, and clinical implications, trying to boil down these complex and often delicate ideas to help busy clinicians do the best job they could in making therapeutic decisions for and with their patients.

Then came 2025, and the nation went through the looking glass.  Legally constituted laws were overridden, constitutional rights were no longer sacrosanct, official budgets turned out to not really be budgets after all. In our world, some of the most basic principles of medical science describing the effectiveness and harms of medical products got tossed aside at the highest levels of government. In statements that would have seemed familiar to George Orwell, in discussing topics from vaccines to mifepristone federal and state officials could in fact declare that 2 + 2 = 5. We should have seen this coming years ago, when a presidential spokesperson introduced the toxic concept of “alternative facts,” or the nation’s most widely-watched news channel got caught repeatedly lying about imaginary plots to rig voting machines.
 
Truth just isn’t what it used to be.  For our community of academic detailers, that’s a problem, and an opportunity.

As we’ve seen, autism has become a focal point for medical product disinformation. Citing a very thin evidence base that none of us would consider reliable, senior administration officials recently declared leucovorin to be a promising treatment for this challenging condition. And the chief of the nation’s health apparatus, with no training at all in science, continued to claim that vaccines cause that condition, while the President himself blamed it on a mother’s use of acetaminophen during pregnancy – a contention that was as cruel as it is baseless. This is what medical risk-benefit communication has come to in 2025.

Paradoxically, this loss of respect for rigorous evidence comes as both bad news and good news for evidence-based academic detailing. Bad news, of course, because overworked primary care clinicians now have to spend precious time they don’t have on new conversations like, “No, Mrs. Jones, little Jimmy’s autism is not your fault,” and explaining that mifepsristone is an effective way to terminate a pregnancy, and vaccines are among the safest and most effective treatments we have to offer, even if the Surgeon General of one state (Florida) is now moving to abolish mandates for their use in children.

​The situation at present is much healthier in countries where evidence-based medicine and unbiased educational outreach aren’t at risk of being mowed down by demagoguery and autocracy-defined science. But even our international colleagues shouldn’t become too complacent; a year ago I never would have expected these grotesque distortions to have become entrenched so quickly here, either.

So where’s the good news? The current chaos makes what we do even more vital, and even more precious. Just as sources of nutritious food and clean water are most needed when people are hungry and surrounded by contaminated slop, a pure source of information untainted by ideology or junk science is even more valuable when people are getting constantly spammed by medical untruths. If it ever were to happen that randomized double-blind trials (an increasingly quaint concept) do one day show that leucovorin cures autism, I know our academic detailing community would be out there educating people about its proper use. And if there is solid epidemiologic evidence that perhaps healthy young people don’t all need constant Covid boosters (which may well be true), we’ll be out there saying that too. 

Unlike our leaders in Washington, our academic detailing programs will continue to encourage evidence-based medical policies, not policy-based medical evidence. As NaRCAD has been saying for years, we’re just ambassadors of the best data, wherever that leads. And at a time of rampant disinformation, that will be more important than ever.

Read more of Jerry's recent media pieces here:
​
"Corporate support cannot make up for threats to the NIH budget: Pharmaceutical money comes with strings"  Stat10 | October 22, 2025
 
WBUR's OnPoint Podcast: Will TrumpRx Actually Lower Drug Prices? On Point with Meghna Chakrabarti, featuring Jerry Avorn, MD | October 16, 2025

A conversation with Vishal Kinkhabwala, MD, MPH, Training Consultant & Expert Facilitator

Being a successful detailer is about so much more than conveying good evidence, or reaching the most clinicians. 

Come and chat with Vishal Kinkhabwala, MD, MPH, a Training Consultant and Expert Facilitator at NaRCAD, as he drops wisdom nuggets about the importance of camaraderie, deep listening, being of service, building rapport, and approaching clinicians as "just a new friend I haven't met yet."  Vishal shares his experiences as a detailer in the area of infectious disease prevention, his tips for building relationships, and the importance of true presence, not "acting like you're listening."

A great episode to tune into for new and veteran detailers alike, and anyone who wants to learn more about the impact of 1:1 clinical outreach education visits in clinicians' own frontline environments.

​Click here for the audio transcription.

Biography: Learn more about Vishal on the Our Team Page.

A conversation with Paul Fanikos, RPh, MPA/HA, COO, Alosa Health, hosted by Bevin Amira, Deputy Director, NaRCAD

Making sure older adults receive a holistic, evidence-based approach to care: learning from Alosa Health.

On our August 2025 episode, we chat with Alosa Health's COO, Paul Fanikos, RPh, MPA/HA, about all things detailing, with a focus on Alosa's recent campaign to support older adults, their providers, and their caregivers in managing the challenges of dementia and Alzheimer's with care, compassion, and connection to the best evidence, resources, and community supports.

Paul shares his insights into the importance of caring for older patients with such complex needs by recognizing that their clinicians and caregivers have equally complex challenges.

Tune in for a conversation that highlights a critical detailing campaign that expertly bridges the best guidelines for care with the humanity, patience, and kindness that must be present when supporting older patients who need memory care.

​"And then what we DID notice, most importantly, were the caregiver resources for patients and also aligning them to local resources that are inexpensive or low cost. And that was something that was incredibly valuable to prescribers and their offices and others, and obviously families. It's a tough disease. It progresses. And to do that in a way that's with dignity for older adults."
-Paul Fanikos, COO, Alosa Health

​Click here for the audio transcription. ​

Host: Bevin Amira, Deputy Director, NaRCAD

A conversation with Zack Jenio, Program Manager, Mile High Behavioral Health/"Dr." Zacharina Jenny-hoe, Drag Queen

Join us for the tea on how to interweave public health initiatives into artistic spaces where community members feel safe, seen, and understood. Zack Jenio, Program Manager of Mile High Behavioral Health in Denver, Colorado, who also hails as Drag Queen Dr. Zacharina Jenny-hoe, discusses the impact of meeting patient needs by bringing harm reduction, including HIV prevention tools and naloxone, to performance spaces.

We also discuss challenges queer patients face in primary care clinics where trust can be unintentionally eroded by stigma; the allure of drag as a celebration of femininity and glamour; and the ways that clinicians can start thinking creatively about patient needs, identity, and access to care--OUTSIDE of the traditional healthcare space. 

​
Click here for the audio transcription.

"It liberates you as a person to be able to learn more and be open to learning more.
​And I think that's the first part. The second part is, and it's something that I always talk about with harm reduction principles: providing resources and care in a non-judgmental, noncoercive way is what's so important."
​
-Zack Jenio/Zacharina Jenny-hoe
Mile High Behavioral Health

Biography.
F. Zack Jenio (any pronouns)
Program Manager, Mile High Behavioral Healthcare
Zack Jenio is the Program Manager for Bee the Vibe, a harm reduction program of Mile High Behavioral Healthcare in Denver, CO. His work in harm reduction lies at the intersection of safer-sex/safer-drug use and Queer communities, ensuring that LGBTQ+ people have access to resources and education to live safer lives. Zack also works as a local drag queen in Denver as Dr. Zackarina Jenny-hoe (not a doctor) in order to bring his harm reduction advocacy into the LGBTQ+ community through the camp and glamour of drag. She organizes and hosts drag events where audiences can get naloxone or STI testing and watch a fun show. She also trains other local Colorado drag artists in prevention principles to create a health advocate network of Queer harm reductionists!

Host: Bevin Amira, Deputy Director, NaRCAD

A conversation with Rocko Cook, Public Health Detailers & Program Manager, Detailing Improved Sexual Health (DISH), Arizona State University 

​Tag: Podcast Series, Evidence Based Medicine

We can't talk about HIV without talking about sex and drugs.

 In this episode, we connect with Rocko Cook, whose over 30 years in the field of HIV prevention, care, and community-building give us insights to the best ways to communicate with patients and clinicians alike. Rocko shares their story of learning about their own HIV+ status; unique projects that meet people "where they're at", including HIV testing in bathhouses; and the importance of partnering with clinicians as a consultant, partner, and advocate of patients.

Learn more about DISH-AZ and the work they do.

​
Click here for the audio transcription.

Biography. Rocko Cook serves as the Program Manager for DISH-AZ (Detailing for Improved Sexual Health in Arizona), a program of the Office of Evaluation and Partner Contracts for the Southwest Interdisciplinary Research Center (SIRC) at Arizona State University in partnership with Arizona Department of Health and Human Services. Rocko began working in the field of HIV in 1994 and is a community leader with over 15 years of experience implementing prevention and care programs in Arizona, Ohio, and Kentucky. In addition to his duties as a program manager, Rocko has served as a public speaker, presenter at local and national conferences, and as a consultant and leader for HIV community planning groups. Rocko has been living with HIV since 2002 and is passionate about improving sexual health for all communities.

Host: Bevin Amira, Deputy Director, NaRCAD

A conversation with Jerry Avorn, MD, Co-Founder and Special Adviser, NaRCAD

​Tag: Podcast Series, Evidence Based Medicine

How do we stay the course and stay rooted in facts amidst a major disruption impacting the healthcare landscape?

"Godfather" and originator of academic detailing Jerry Avorn joins the show to share his reflections on the current state of healthcare; the history of treatment and medications prior to rigorous study; his new book, Rethinking Medications; the critical importance of treating evidence, facts, and science as our collective North Star; and where we can look to a future where there is hope of correcting our course back towards the kind of evidence-based clinical care and health policy that we need, now more than ever!

Visit rethinkmeds.info to connect with other Rethinking Medications readers, listeners, and thinkers, and check out the 2025 academic detailing systematic review mentioned in this episode, along with one from 2007.

(Click here for the audio transcription.)

"I'm hoping [...] that we will at some point, when we look back maybe a year from now, at the havoc that is being created on a daily basis in terms of our healthcare system, in terms of sowing doubt about treatments that work, about taking away coverage for things that are actually helping people, particularly disadvantaged populations." 

-Jerry Avorn, MD

​Jerry Avorn, MD (he/him)
Co-Founder & Special Adviser, NaRCAD
​Dr. Avorn is Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Chief Emeritus of the Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacoeconomics (DoPE) at Brigham & Women's Hospital. A general internist, geriatrician, and drug epidemiologist,  he pioneered the concept of academic detailing and is recognized internationally as a leading expert on this topic and on optimal medication use, particularly in the elderly. Read more.


​Want more? Follow us on Spotify or Apple!

Host: Anna Morgan-Barsamian, MPH, RN, PMP, Senior Manager, Training & Education, NaRCAD

A conversation with Bevin Amira, Deputy Director, NaRCAD
​
​Tag: Podcast Series, Evidence Based Medicine

How can public health professionals stay resilient and connected
​when the landscape is shifting beneath their feet?

In this episode, Anna Morgan-Barsamian passes the mic to Bevin Amira, NaRCAD’s Deputy Director and interim host, for a conversation on navigating devastating public health funding cuts and the rising spread of misinformation. Together, they explore how detailers can stay grounded in evidence, sustain meaningful relationships with clinicians, and lean into the power of community during challenging times.

*Stay tuned until the end for a special discount to NaRCAD’s upcoming AD Virtual Summit!

(Click here for the audio transcription.) 

Bevin directs NaRCAD’s communications and strategic partnerships, building collaborations with public health leaders at the national and federal level. With career experience in building learning communities to increase engagement and sustainability, Bevin has expertise in creating interactive, interdisciplinary training curricula at healthcare-based non-profits. In collaboration with the dynamic NaRCAD team, Bevin facilitates NaRCAD's virtual and in-person learning sessions to encourage hands-on skill development and best practices sharing amongst peer programs. Read more.

Want more? Follow us on Spotify or Apple!

Host: Anna Morgan-Barsamian, MPH, RN, PMP, Senior Manager, Training & Education, NaRCAD

A conversation with Maggie Kaufmann, MPH, MA, Director of Harm Reduction Programs, University of Illinois Chicago
​
​Tag: Podcast Series, Evidence Based Medicine, ​Harm Reduction

How can harm reduction strategies not only save lives but also challenge stigma and transform communities?

In this episode, Maggie Kaufmann, Director of Harm Reduction Programs at the University of Illinois Chicago dives deep into harm reduction strategies, exploring how these evidence-based approaches save lives, combat stigma, and integrate with academic detailing projects. Maggie shares insights on transformative and creative harm reduction initiatives, including drug checking, mobile medications for opioid use disorder (MOUD) services, overdose prevention sites, and community-based education in local theaters. Tune in for a compelling conversation on the evolving landscape of harm reduction and its impact on public health. 

​If you have any questions about integrating harm reduction into academic detailing projects, please contact Maggie at [email protected].

(Click here for the audio transcription.) 

Maggie has been with the Community Outreach Intervention Projects (COIP) at University of Illinois Chicago for almost ten years in several roles including overseeing both research studies and service provision for People Who Use Drugs (PWUD). She brings with her expertise in harm reduction, hepatitis C prevention interventions, case management/recovery support and clinical capacity building. She earned her Master of Public Health and Master of Arts in Anthropology from University of Illinois Chicago (UIC), in 2014. Prior to her work with COIP she taught courses in anthropology at the undergraduate level with a focus on the effects of racism and other modes of discrimination on healthcare access and quality. Currently, she is the Harm Reduction Services Coordinator for COIP, Project Director for a NIDA-funded study evaluating an intervention to reduce opioid overdoses among those with criminal legal system involvement in Illinois, and Director of the NACCHO-funded, Harm Reduction Academic Detailing Project at UIC. She also has experience with provider education and clinical capacity building and regularly speaks to diverse groups in the health sciences around harm reduction and how to integrate these principles and practices into clinical settings. She is passionate about improving the health and wellbeing of PWUD and reducing stigma around substance use to increase access to nonjudgmental, person-centered care and supportive services.  

Want more? Follow us on Spotify or Apple!

Host: Anna Morgan-Barsamian, MPH, RN, PMP, Senior Manager, Training & Education, NaRCAD

A conversation with Tahirih McAleer, BSP, Academic Detailer, RxFiles Academic Detailing Program and Loren Regier, BA, BSP, Consultant Pharmacist, RxFiles Academic Detailing Program
​
​Tag: Podcast Series, Evidence Based Medicine

How do we navigate uncertainty in our conversations?

 Join us as we hear from our colleagues at RxFiles Academic Detailing Program as they share strategies for handling uncertainty. From balancing preparation with the inevitable "I don't knows" to practicing presence in both professional and personal settings, this episode offers insights into how detailers can make deeper connections and have more meaningful discussions. Tune in to learn how embracing discomfort can lead to growth and confidence.

(Click here for the audio transcription.) 

Loren is a Pharmacist and Consultant Editor with RxFiles Academic Detailing Service in Saskatoon, SK, Canada. Loren has guided the development of this provincial academic detailing service since the first “ground breaking” pilot project began in 1997. Loren is active as a member of the Canadian Academic Detailing Collaboration and provides training and consultation to various programs and initiatives. Loren’s interests cover the practical application of evidence to practice and the ongoing development of multifaceted interventions that support academic detailing. Additionally, Loren serves as a faculty facilitator for NaRCAD’s Academic Detailing Techniques trainings. Read more.

Tahirih graduated from the College of Pharmacy and Nutrition at the University of
Saskatchewan in 2015. Since then, she has been working in community pharmacies
in rural settings. She joined RxFiles as an academic detailer in 2018 where she
primarily visits rural health care providers. Tahirih is passionate about improving
accessibility to primary care practices. Outside of healthcare practices, Tahirih
and her husband run a mixed animal veterinary clinic alongside their 2 young
boys.​

​
Want more? Follow us on Spotify or Apple!