Payal Bhandari, MD: SFMS April 2014 Member of the Month April 28, 2014 Member of the Month, SFMS Member Member of the Month, Payal Bhandari, SFMS Member 0 Payal Bhandari, MD is a solo independent family physician in Upper Pacific Heights. She was born in New Jersey and raised in West Virginia. Dr. Bhandari completed her undergraduate at West Virginia University (a.k.a., WVU), and with her continued passion to become a family doctor, she completed medical school at WVU. After finishing her family practice residency training at the University of Massachusetts, Payal, her husband, Nilesh, and then 18-month-old daughter, Maya, decided to “try out” San Francisco before they would “place their roots” back in the East Coast. They quickly fell in love with the Bay Area and have called it home ever since. Dr. Bhandari started her career in San Francisco at a small Laurel Heights practice with another family physician. After 6 years the boutique practice was acquired by a large corporation and transformed into a large clinic called My Health Medical Group. Once this practice became nationally recognized as the first patient-centered medical home in San Francisco, Dr. Bhandari decided to open her own solo practice focused on the patient-doctor relationship and the quality of time spent to truly help others. She takes her strong clinical knowledge and excellent listening skills to understand the patient’s needs. Through mutual respect and collaborative communication, Dr. Bhandari provides holistic care to modify illness and restore health back into one’s life. Click here to view Dr. Payal Bhandari's practice information. Why are you an SFMS member? SFMS is a great resource for connecting with the community, other members, and being well informed about what is going on in medicine today. SFMS cares deeply about patients and its members. Which SFMS member resource is most helpful to you? San Francisco Medicine, the journal of the SFMS, is a great resource for learning about the most important trends in medicine today. Its articles are thought-provoking. I also enjoy the professional networking mixers organized by SFMS. The mixers creates wonderful opportunities to connect with other members and exchange ideas. What do you like to do when you’re not at work? I love to run in Golden Gate Park and along Ocean Beach and am always considering training for another half marathon. You can also find me at my daughters’ extra-curricular activities, skiing in Lake Tahoe, or traveling in general. What is the most important thing you learned in medical school or residency? By actively listening to patients’ stories and looking deeper past their immediate symptoms, one can see the multi-faceted, interesting people we take care of each day. By embracing the mind, body, and spirit of a person, we can discover the root cause of illnesses, and help patients regain their health. If humanity is the central focus of medicine, the journey is full of knowledge and rewards. What are some of the biggest opportunities or challenges you see in health care within the next five year? As medicine becomes increasingly about population management of chronic diseases through technology and metrics, the quality of the patient experience may continue to suffer. The cost of health care may unfortunately continue to rise since the focus on lifestyle management and empowerment of patients is not central to the insurance payment model, and hence, our medical model. There are opportunities many of us are creating today to focus on the healing of the whole person to make the long-term positive impacts on health care. What do you love most about practicing family medicine? I enjoy the breadth of interesting cases I encounter each day, and how challenging and interesting family medicine continues to be. I am blessed with the opportunity to create long-term relationships with individuals and families of all ages, and make lasting differences in their lives. What is your favorite restaurant in San Francisco? We recently went to check out and support our good friend’s newly opened pizza parlor, Presidio Pizza Company on 1862 Divisidero Street. We were surprisingly thrilled to discover it serves the best New York-style pizza in the city. The pizzas are mouth-wateringly delicious, and it has one of the best dessert pizzas around. The ambiance is super fun for families, couples, or anyone just dying for an amazing slice of good ol’ pizza. If you weren't a physician, what profession would you like to try? I have always considered going to culinary school to become a dessert/pastry chef. Creating desserts allows one to physically work with masterpieces and demonstrate creative intelligence while still bringing joy to the consumers. Comments are closed.
