Faculty Feature: Dr. DENISE HOWARD

For this newsletter’s Faculty Feature, Francis He and Nick Bartelo had the opportunity to sit down with Dr. Denise Howard. Dr. Howard received her undergraduate degree from the University of Mississippi. She earned her MD and Masters in Public Heath from Johns Hopkins in 1993. Dr. Howard completed residency at the University of Pittsburgh’s Magee Women's Hospital in 1997, followed by a fellowship in Urogynecology at the University of Michigan. Dr. Howard became a member of the faculty at the University of Michigan until 2001 before going into  private practice in the Atlanta area until 2010. At this time, she moved to the Middle East where she worked in various leadership positions in Abu Dhabi and Doha, including serving as an assistant professorship of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Weill Cornell Medicine- Qatar. She returned to the U.S. at the end of 2019, serving as the Chief of Gynecology for Geisinger Health System until April of 2022 when she moved to New York City to start her current role as Chief of Obstetrics and Gynecology at New York-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist and Vice Chair in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology Weill Cornell Medicine. She was recently promoted to Associate Professor of Clinical Obstetrics and Gynecology. Dr. Howard's education and experiences has led to her focus on improving health literacy, engaging women, and incorporating technology into healthcare delivery as the way to equitable health. She is in the beginning stages of founding ConsenSurg, a company focused on standardizing the surgical consent process. Dr. Howard is leading the way towards an equitable healthcare system. 

SVG: ConsenSurg targets the patient consent process and helps patients to understand the procedure they are taking. Can you tell us more about how ConsenSurg works and what stage the company is at now?
 
Dr. Howard: ConsenSurg is still in the early stages, I haven’t officially launched the company but that’s the name of it. I am a gynecologicl surgeon for the most part and I am also the chief down at Brooklyn Methodist Hospital. Growing up in Mississippi and practicing medicine across the U.S. and internationally, I have seen firsthand the disparities in care delivery. It is very challenging for us to provide consistent care to every patient and especially in counseling for the surgical consent process. We are at the point of technology where we can do a better job of standardizing the surgical consent process, ensuring that every patient receives the same clear and thorough information about their procedures. This was something that I conceived of a long time ago and now we are trying to figure out how we can use technology to do a better job at delivering this information .  

SVG: Your background is quite extensive as you have worked in multiple states and countries since receiving your MD. How has your experience working at many different places helped you realize the need to create ConsenSurg and prepare you for this startup endeavor? 

Dr. Howard: In academia, we often assume everyone practices medicine the same way, but that’s not true. In private practice, balancing productivity with patient care is tough, especially when patients have different levels of health literacy. The complexity of counseling increases, particularly when English is not the patient’s first language, as is the case with many patients here in Brooklyn. Additionally, physicians face pressure to maintain productivity, and personality differences or a lack of shared commonalities can further complicate communication. Twenty to thirty minutes with a patient just isn’t enough time to break through these barriers and deliver the education they need. These diverse experiences have made me more sensitive to the disparities in care and the many factors that contribute to them, reinforcing the need for a more personalized, equitable approach.

SVG: You earned your Masters in Public Health alongside your MD at Johns Hopkins. What made you pursue a Masters in addition to the MD and how has it influenced the way you practice medicine?

Dr. Howard: I imagined that I would be in academics and most medical students were not trained to be clinical researchers. A Masters in public health was the program that was available to help train us. It exposed me to concepts of public health that don’t align with how we approach medical care. For example, we spend a lot of time, money, and effort in medicine investigating diseases that have a low prevalence, as opposed to putting just as much effort into  preventative things like vaccinations or cancer screenings. The Masters helped me develop a preventative mind frame. I learned to think about the things that could have been done earlier that might have prevented the poor outcome. From a leadership role, the perspective I add is focused on the things that we can do to prevent disease. Prevention rather than  treatment is cheaper from both a financial and health perspective for the patient.  

SVG: How was your experience participating in Weill Cornell’s 100K Business Plan Challenge? What were some of the most important takeaways you learned? How were you able to create such an impressive pitch for your product that you were able to win first place? How will this money be used by the company to get ConsenSurg to the next stage in its development?

Dr. Howard: One of the things that I quickly appreciated after moving to NYC is that in order to be successful, you need to be in the right environment. I am grateful that Cornell supports and encourages entrepreneurial thinking and product development. The 100K Business Plan Challenge educates you on how to launch your company in a strategic manner to be successful. Also, the biggest thing is the introduction and the ability to network with other people who have experience with entrepreneurship. People are generous with their time and advice, and I received a lot of help on my pitch for the competition. 
The big value of winning the pitch competition was the recognition that my product is of value. I plan to use the money to pay a medical illustrator to develop a minimally viable product to prove the idea works. We will have the product tested by surgeons, then get feedback from other stakeholders. All of this will stem from the 100K Business Plan Challenge.

SVG: What would be your advice for graduate students and post-docs who want to start a company?

Dr. Howard: You need a team that compliments you. If you are the technical founder, you need someone who has business experience and knowledge, and someone who has experience in the health side (if it is in the healthcare space) of the product to identify who will be your customer and how your product solves the customer’s needs. There are great ideas out there but to be successful it has to be great for the person who is going to buy it. There are pros and cons to when you elect to start a company. If you do it early in your career you may have the luxury of focusing your time and effort on building a company. This becomes challenging for someone who is mid-career with the responsibility of caring for a family and perhaps down the road in their career. On the other hand, an experienced professional will have more insight into the needs of their customers (in my case it’s the patients/health systems/healthcare providers).