Damion Simpson started at the University of Florida planning to become an architect. He left with a bachelor’s degree in health science and an acceptance to the Howard University College of Medicine.
Today, Dr. Simpson practices emergency medicine and teaches medical students and residents at both MedStar Georgetown University Hospital and MedStar Harbor Hospital in Baltimore. He holds a Master of Policy Management from Georgetown University’s McCourt School of Public Policy and recently joined Applied Policy as a fellow.
Having graduated from a math and science magnet high school in Broward County, Florida, Simpson originally saw architecture as a natural fit for his strengths and interests. He describes having something akin to “a moment of panic” in college when he realized that the field wasn’t for him. His pivot to medicine was supported by one of his eight siblings who is a nurse. Shadowing an OB/GYN and working as a hospital scribe during his junior year ultimately cemented his interest.
While medical school prepared Simpson for the clinical aspects of his work, he observes that it failed to provide a framework for understanding how the rules and regulations that often dictate care delivery are developed. His interest in making sense of healthcare policy eventually led him to his studies at the McCourt School.
Simpson would like the bridge of understanding between medicine and policy to run both ways. A requirement may “make sense on paper,” he says, but play out differently with real patients. He points to sepsis protocols as an example, noting that patients do not necessarily arrive at the emergency department with textbook presentations. He also observed that well-intentioned rules can add to clinicians’ administrative burden and limit valuable face time with patients.
Asked what members of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee might learn from spending an overnight shift in the ED with him, Simpson said they could expect to see patients arriving with multiple concerns, including conditions requiring specialist attention or ongoing management that an emergency department was never designed to provide. Physicians, meanwhile, would be challenged to coordinate, provide, and document care, while simultaneously meeting compliance requirements and teaching.
The contrast with policy work isn’t lost on him. At Applied Policy, he notes, he can come in and have “a nice cordial conversation.” The emergency department offers no such guarantee. Policy development allows time for research, discussion, and revision, while emergency medicine often demands decisions within minutes. Working in both settings has given Simpson an appreciation for the difficulty of applying policies developed through one process to the very different realities of the other.
Simpson may ultimately pursue a career in consulting. He is especially interested in how ownership of hospitals and physician practices is structured and the growing role of private equity in healthcare.
(And yes, we asked. Simpson says he has seen one episode of The Pitt. It was reminiscent enough of an average workday that he wasn’t compelled to watch another.)
