Heart Behind the White Coat: Dr. Soojin Jun
Dr. Soojin Jun is a Population Health Pharmacist at Oak Street Health and co-founder of Patients for Patient Safety US. She is a board-certified geriatric pharmacist and received her Doctor of Pharmacy degree from the University of Illinois Chicago. In Heart Behind the White Coat (HBWC) programs, DHH features healthcare professionals to learn the sparks that motivate HCPs to explore careers in medicine and how their passion endures.
In this HBWC program, Dr. Jun explains what initially inspired her to become a pharmacist. Dr. Jun shares what continues to drive her passion in medicine and patient advocacy and her advice to students aspiring to become healthcare professionals.
How did you become interested in a career in medicine?
While caring for my father during his journey as a cancer patient, we stumbled upon barrier after barrier with language and cultural differences. He had multiple ER visits due to adverse medication events that repeated the same courses both times within a month, and we became more desperate. He wanted to get care in his home country where the care would be more affordable and more comprehensive, not to mention fewer barriers. But one week before his flight, he suffered from severe abdominal pain and passed away. This experience was a shock to me and changed everything. I was so determined to make a difference so that no one would need to go through what we went through. I was contemplating a career change before his death and was interested in medicine, but I decided on training as a pharmacist as I felt it was a bridge between doctors and patients. I also felt that I could use the help for myself as well.
What drives your passion to continue your work in the medical field?
I sometimes wonder if all this is a nightmare as I think about so many patients getting hurt and having nowhere to turn to when things go wrong. How are we tolerating medical harm as acceptable? If I chose not to speak up for my dad, it would be like he didn't exist. There is no way to know, as our care is so industrialized in the U.S. There is no accountability, and patients deserve better diagnosis, treatment, and care. I also advocate on behalf of clinicians that they deserve better working conditions as well that rewards patient outcomes instead of the quantity of patients they see.
What advice do you have for others considering a career in the medical field?
The system can exhaust you, but that doesn't mean you must follow the same system. Listen to your heart to see if this is what you are called to do. That is the foremost priority in determining whether the medical field is the right fit for you as a career choice.
What’s a fun fact about yourself that you’d like to share?
I was so impatient in my desire for changes to happen in healthcare, and I participated in multiple business plan competitions with my friends. The primary idea was a pharmacist would be a personal advocate for patients for the first 30 days after a hospital discharges them to prevent hospital readmission. I poured my heart into this business plan, as I felt it could have helped my case. We kept winning many competitions and also advanced as one of the eight finalists from schools all over the country at the South by Southwest (SXSW) student competition. We didn't win the competition, but I met the CTO of PillPack there who asked for help in growing his company, which was bought by Amazon five years later. It was a golden opportunity that I missed out on, because I couldn't take it at the time!
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