The El Paso Physician, a monthly video broadcast, has targeted medical misinformation on the city’s PBS affiliate for almost three decades, and with marked successes under its belt, continues to improve health outcomes and patient-physician relationships.
The brainchild of late El Paso rheumatologist Raj Marwah, MD, and made possible with the support of the El Paso County Medical Society (EPCMS), the program runs the last Thursday of every month and has covered a myriad of public health topics for almost 30 years, including breast cancer screenings and common symptoms of heat exhaustion.
Patsy Slaughter, executive director of EPCMS, calls the long-standing broadcast a “labor of love” for El Paso patients, by their local physicians.
“We constantly solicit feedback from our viewers to meet their needs and to answer their most pressing questions,” she said.
For example, in 2023, the broadcast featured a special episode on the benefits of routine immunizations. El Paso physicians say vaccination rates then rose in the city – due in no small part to the Texas Medical Association’s Vaccines Defend What Matters program.
El Paso internist Roxanne Tyroch, MD, who worked with colleagues on the broadcast both in 2023 and in years past, said that assistance helped physicians in the area answer patients’ vaccine questions “wherever they are, whenever they need it.”
Physician-led efforts like these may be particularly helpful as the U.S. battles a surge of preventable diseases. This year, the country recorded the most confirmed measles cases in a single year since the disease was declared eliminated in 2000.
“We try to do whatever we can to enhance trust between patients and their physicians,” said Dr. Tyroch, a member of TMA’s Committee on Independent Physician Practice. “The great thing about the TMA Foundation grant is that it helped us provide an essential service to the community while maintaining a positive relationship with individuals that may be averse to vaccines.”
Longtime program contributor Alison Days, MD, is unsurprised that The El Paso Physician has witnessed such a strong response from the public. After all, strengthening the patient-physician relationship was always “Dr. Marwah’s goal,” Dr. Days said.
A year after Dr. Marwah’s passing, his colleagues honor his memory by continuing the program he loved so much – and they “won’t stop any time soon,” Dr. Days said. Upcoming episodes plan to feature information on changes to Medicaid, trending medical technologies, and more.
Dr. Days says the broadcast’s participants, including local physicians and EPCMS staff, meticulously choose its topics based on what is important to patients, so they can receive information from physicians rather than outside sources, like the internet.
“To an extent, it’s a constantly changing program – but that’s what I love about it. It morphs to meet the needs of our population,” the El Paso pediatrician said. “I’m just so happy to be a part of this program, and to continue the work of our champion Dr. Marwah.”
To watch the Vaccines Defend What Matters El Paso Physician episode, visit the PBS video page. New episodes air the last Thursday of each month on KCOS-TV, El Paso’s public television station, and archived episodes are available on the program’s website
For more information, visit TMA’s Vaccines Defend What Matters and TMAF’s webpages.
Alisa Pierce
Reporter, Division of Communications and Marketing
(512) 370-1469