Teaching at The University of Toledo College of Medicine and Life Science, Dr. Kristopher Brickman found his students were not satisfied with learning medicine on a small scale.
They wanted a global health program, says Brickman, an emergency medicine doctor. He was heartened by the students’ interest, it is a passion of his own, and he was happy to accommodate them.
“I had already been involved in a lot of international missions in Haiti ever since my second year of medical school,” Brickman says.
Brickman’s global health resume also includes being a part of a delegation to China to develop the first EMS system there for the Beijing Olympics while also assisting in setting up the medical infrastructure for the event. In fact, it was this prominent role in China that caught his students’ attention and prompted their inquiries about a global health program at UT.
“The global health program really was a student-led initiative.” Dr. Kristopher R. Brickman
The program was initiated in 2007 and has established international collaborations in Lebanon, the Philippines, Pakistan, India, Jordan, China and Ethiopia.
Brickman grew up in Lexington, Ohio and attended The Ohio State University, competing on the wrestling team there.
“I was taking a full breadth of classes – law, … science. I was on the pre-med route; however, I initially decided to do the pre-law route,” says Brickman. “But it was interesting to compete in the environment of science classes, as I enjoyed the challenge of those courses. The experience gave me an opportunity to define who I am and define what I do.”
He also reminisces about his athletic past, and how his athlete status caused some OSU advisers to doubt his odds of scientific success.
“I was a jock and they didn’t expect me to perform well,” he laughs. “However, even though I was doing well, I guess they just never took me seriously.” - Dr. Kristopher R. Brickman
After graduating from OSU, Brickman attended medical school at Wright State University en route to pursuing a career in emergency medicine, which was just beginning to emerge as a specific specialization.
“Emergency medicine was relatively new when I graduated medical school in 1983,” he says. “I was just intrigued by it because I like to see people get better rapidly. I was kind of an entrepreneur, and felt emergency medicine provided that scope of care.”
Brickman developed an organization that staffed hospitals all throughout northwest Ohio, eventually using that experience to lead UT’s Medical Center Emergency Department, formerly known as the Medical College of Ohio, in 1992. The position eventually gave him the chance to develop a residency program in emergency medicine.
When Brickman’s students came to him about the global health program, the college polled students to gauge interest.
“Ninety-seven percent of them had an interest in a global health program and 79 percent of them said they would fund at least part of it, so I got tasked with developing the program,” he says.
The key to a successful global health program, he says, is not merely for his students to gain experience, but to learn.
“It is crucial for our students to understand how the world is working. We must be able to understand other cultures, and the health care systems of other cultures,” says Brickman. “It will help our students deal with the world we live in. Thus, I need to take students out of their comfort zone.”
Iraqi Endeavors
Brickman’s extensive global health background has also led him to pursue other endeavors, such as an emergency medicine program in Iraq.
“I had a good friend of mine, a Lebanese physician. He knew I was getting more involved in global health, and we joined on a project in the Middle East,” Brickman says. “He was at the American University of Beirut, which is a prominent academic medical institution in the Middle East. I go over there and give some lectures from time to time, and one time, I attended a major Middle East conference where I got integrated with Iraq.”
Given that he already had experience in global health, and had worked with Saudi Arabian students and their embassy, he was just the person to lead a new group to start such an endeavor in Iraq. Brickman began working on a plan to take an emergency medicine delegation to Iraq and offer an improvement from the primitive conditions in many parts of the country.
However, after ISIS started creating problems in the region, Brickman and his colleagues created a new plan.
“We decided to talk to the Iraqis at a neutral site where we can have a meeting and develop the program, and when we did this, they willingly embraced it,” he says. “We created a conference at the University of Beirut. This allowed us to focus our training program to refine the doctors into functional emergency medicine doctors. “
Unfortunately, the rising tensions in the region have forced the program into a “holding pattern,” Brickman says, though he and his colleagues are fully prepared to jump back in as soon as possible.
Avoiding the ER
More than 9.2 million people are treated in emergency rooms each year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported in 2008.
“Falling on a hand (or) wrist, twisting an ankle, back pain; these are the most common things we see in the emergency room.” - Dr. Kristopher R. Brickman
Many household injuries are not ER-worthy, though, and patients need to use a certain amount of discretion, he says.
“If you twist your ankle, it doesn’t mean it’s broken or that it needs an X-ray, as (such injuries) rarely are fractures,” he says. “The rule we use for the ER is if you can put weight on it and walk on your ankle, you can be confident — even if the body part is swelling — that it’s not broken.”
If he were to see that type of injury in the emergency room, Brickman would most likely apply a hook-and-loop fastener splint and suggest over-the-counter Advil or Motrin. The patient should follow up in a week and only go to the doctor for an X-ray if there has been no improvement.
Household injuries sometimes look gruesome, says Brickman, but looks can be deceiving.
“It’s all a matter of how much you can function, not swelling,” he says.
David Allen is a contributing writer. Feedback is welcome at feedback@cityscenemediagroup.com.
About the Expert
Dr. Kristopher R. Brickman, MD, FACEP is professor and chairman of emergency medicine and medical director of the emergency department at The University of Toledo. He graduated from Wright State University School of Medicine in 1983 and completed an emergency medicine residency at St. Vincent Medical Center/Toledo Hospital in 1988. He is founder and director of the Office of Global Health at The University of Toledo College of Medicine and Life Sciences and has served as president of The University of Toledo Physicians since July 2012.
