A Dose of Optimism

For episode 50, the microphone gets turned around. Omkar Kulkarni, host, KidsX founder, and pediatric healthcare innovator, takes the guest seat as A Dose of Optimism celebrates its 50th episode milestone. Omkar reflects on why he built this show, what drew him to children's healthcare, and where he believes technology and AI are taking us next. He shares his views on mental health support fo...

Female athletes face risks that the science has historically been too slow to address, in part because much of what we know about sports injury and performance was derived from research on male athletes. In this second episode of the youth sports series, two experts share what they're doing about it. Maya Hayes, associate head coach of the University of Minnesota women's soccer program a...

Autism affects nearly 1 in 31 children in the United States, and yet in many ways, we are still in the early stages of understanding what it actually is, and what it takes to support the children and families living with it. In this episode, two innovators share how they are advancing the science and the care of autism from very different angles. Dr. Shafali Jeste, Professor and Mattel Executive E...

Youth sports are one of the most powerful forces for development in a child's life. They're also, when done wrong, one of the most reliable ways to injure a child, physically and mentally. In this first episode of a two-part series on youth sports, two experts share what they're seeing at the frontlines of pediatric sports medicine and concussion management. Dr. Bianca Edison, sport...

What does it cost when a patient can't understand their discharge instructions? What does it cost when a healthcare system hasn't adapted its business models to the tools now available? In this episode, two very different conversations shed light on where healthcare is losing people, and what's being done about it. Julie Wilner and Joe Corkery of Jaide Health, recently acquired by A...

Before a child can learn, they need to be able to see. And before a nurse can care for a complex pediatric patient, they need to have experienced something close to it. In this episode, two leaders at the intersection of innovation and workforce development share how they are closing two very different but equally foundational gaps. Dr. James Dickhoner, Chief Medical Officer of Vision to Learn and...

Healthcare treats the diagnosis, but what about everything else a family carries alongside it? In this episode, two innovators share their work on the parts of the care experience that clinical medicine often misses. Dr. Megan Visser, hospital chaplain, sociologist, and postdoctoral research fellow at The Saban Research Institute at CHLA, describes what spiritual care looks like across the spectru...

Two things children need more of: someone who shows up for them, and food that doesn't harm them. In this episode, two innovators share their work on both sides of that equation. Amy Braun, President and CEO of HealthCorps, describes how her organization deploys college-age mentors into middle and high schools across 12 states to deliver health and wellness programming, and why the near-peer...

What happens to the patients the system never quite finds? In this episode, two teams share how they are using technology to reach children who have been invisible to specialist care, whether because of geography, or because the signs of their rare disease didn't add up to a referral. Dr. Carl Rosen, Alaska's only board-certified oculoplastic and neuro-ophthalmology surgeon, describes ho...

Healthcare workers are facing a crisis that rarely makes headlines, and it's getting worse. In this episode, three innovators share what's really happening to nurses and other frontline clinical staff, and what's being done about it. Sandy Hall, Executive Director, PCS Quality, Safety, and Patient-Centered Services at Children's Hospital Los Angeles, describes the landscape of...

What would it mean to catch a problem earlier, whether it's a child missing therapy between sessions, a student whose mental health needs are going unidentified, or a promising young researcher who never gets the mentorship to find their path? In this episode, three innovators share how they are working to close the gaps that appear before the crisis. George Frey of Cognishine and Arie Melame...

What if technology could make a frightened child feel safer, less alone, or better understood, without replacing the human beings who care for them? In this episode, three innovators share how they are using avatars, robots, and wearable sensors to improve the pediatric care experience. Erin Bogdanski, licensed therapist, CEO and Founder of THERA VR, describes how virtual reality with customizable...

Three very different innovations. Three very different settings. One shared direction: pediatric care moving closer to children and families. Dr. John Cleveland, Associate Chief of Cardiothoracic Surgery at Children's Hospital Los Angeles, shares the science and the hope behind xenotransplantation, the use of genetically modified pig hearts as a bridge to human heart transplantation for infan...

For too long, diabetes and obesity in children have been treated as failures of willpower, by the child, by the parent, by the family. In this episode, three innovators share how they are rewriting that story. Dr. Jennifer Raymond, Division Chief of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism at CHLA, describes her community-based research with Latinx families living with type 1 diabetes, and what she...

What does it look like to meet a child where they are, not just physically, but technologically, emotionally, and clinically? In this episode, three innovators share how they are redesigning pediatric care delivery around the child rather than around the hospital. Dr. Caitlin Sayegh, clinical psychologist and researcher at CHLA and USC Keck School of Medicine, describes her work using cell phone c...

Twenty years ago, the HPV vaccine was approved in the United States. It is one of the most powerful cancer prevention tools ever developed, protecting against 90% of HPV-related cancers, with a safety record spanning more than 500 million doses worldwide. And yet today, only about 63% of eligible adolescents in the US are fully vaccinated. In this special anniversary episode, six voices from acros...

What if the most effective treatments for children looked nothing like traditional medicine? In this episode, three innovators share how games, biofeedback, and AI are being used to treat some of the most overlooked conditions in pediatric healthcare. Juliette Hawa, pediatric physical therapist and founder of PFRx, describes how a gamified biofeedback device is helping children with pelvic floor d...

Thirty episodes in, and this is a special one. Over the first 30 episodes of A Dose of Optimism, host Omkar Kulkarni has sat down with physicians, founders, researchers, and change makers working at the edges of what's possible in pediatric healthcare. In this episode, he revisits some of the moments that stayed with him the longest, ideas that challenged conventional thinking, insights that...

What happens when the people who need care most are also the least likely to receive it? In this episode, two innovators share how they are building solutions for populations that healthcare has consistently underserved, BIPOC mothers navigating the perinatal period, and children living with pain from complex medical conditions. Priya Iyer, Founder & CEO of Our Roots, describes how her virtual...

Teenagers today are navigating something genuinely new, a world where the pressure to belong, the weight of social expectations, and the tools of social media and AI are all arriving at once, during the most identity-defining years of their lives. In this episode, two researchers and innovators share what the data actually shows about youth well-being, and what's being done to help. Dr. Krist...

What does it take to reach a pregnant mother in rural Kenya, and a teenager in America who's been told not to trust vaccines? In this second episode recorded at the Clinton Global Initiative, two innovators share how they are working to close two very different but equally urgent gaps in children's health. Dr. Lorraine Muluka, obstetrician and founder of Malaika, describes how her matern...

What does it take to deliver healthcare to the children who are hardest to reach, in conflict zones, refugee settlements, and communities where the health system has collapsed entirely? In this episode, recorded in the context of the Clinton Global Initiative, two innovators share how they are working to close some of the world's most urgent gaps in care for children and families. James Rober...

Half of children in the United States don't have easy access to quality pediatric care. And for children with epilepsy, even accessing the right diagnosis (let alone the right treatment) has until recently been out of reach for many families. In this episode, two pediatric innovators share how they are working to close those gaps. Dr. Lyndsey Garbi, co-founder of Blueberry Pediatrics, describ...

What does healing look like beyond the medical chart?  In this episode, two practitioners at Children's Hospital Los Angeles share how art, music, and virtual reality are playing meaningful roles in pediatric care, not as extras, but as essential parts of the patient experience. Nicole Albers, art therapist and Team Lead for the Mark Taper – Johnny Mercer Artists Program at CHLA, explains how...

Some of the most common conditions affecting children today remain among the most underserved, and some of the rarest are only just beginning to be understood. In this episode, four innovators share how they are rethinking the diagnosis, treatment, and access pathways for pediatric chronic conditions. Dr. Jonathan Santoro, pediatric neurologist at Children's Hospital Los Angeles, shares his r...