From Caregiver to Patient
Jeremy Boal, MD, spent years caring for patients with late-stage ALS—known as Lou Gehrig's disease, it's a neurological disease that typically comes with a life expectancy of 2-5 years from diagnosis. Then he was diagnosed with that very condition.
In this podcast, Dr. Boal reflects on his medical and personal trajectory with new insights. He discusses the importance of addressing anger and dread, the role of family and friends, and the need for both medical and psychological help and for developing resilience.
Stephen Calabria: [00:00:00] From the Mount Sinai Health System in New York City, this is Road to Resilience, a podcast about facing adversity. I'm your host, Stephen Calabria, Mount Sinai's Director of Podcasting.
On this episode, we welcome Jeremy Boal, MD. Dr. Boal has spent decades on the front lines of healthcare, caring for patients in their homes, reshaping health systems, and working to build a more compassionate, equitable model of care.
But in 2023, his understanding of those questions shifted when he was diagnosed with ALS. As you'll hear, Dr. Boal reflects on what it means to confront mortality, not as a concept, but as a reality.
His journey demonstrates the true meaning of resilience and the power of perspective in facing life's greatest challenges. We're honored to welcome Dr. Jeremy Boal to the show.
Dr. Jeremy Boal welcome to Road to Resilience.
Jeremy Boal: Thank you, Stephen. Good to be with you.
Stephen Calabria: Could you walk us through your years in [00:01:00] medicine and what your particular focus was?
Jeremy Boal: Sure. I am an internist and geriatrician. I spent most of my career at Mount Sinai, where I was a resident as well as a geriatrics fellow.
I spent the first 10 years of my career co-founding and helping to build and run the Mount Sinai Visiting Doctors Program, which is a program for home-based care for people with serious and late stage illness. And then I went on to a number of other administrative roles.
I was Chief Medical Officer of the Northwell Health System, and then I came back to New York City to be the Chief Medical Officer of the new Mount Sinai Health System, when Mount Sinai merged with Continuum. And I stayed in that role till November of 2023.
Stephen Calabria: What did you observe specifically in your work with geriatrics patients? What lessons did you take?
Jeremy Boal: Oh, endless, particularly those first 10 years when I was spending most of my clinical time doing home visits. I felt like I gained a tremendous amount of insight [00:02:00] into the nature of suffering.