#307 - 🚀 Tech Tuesday – Empowering Parents in the NICU: The Consult Cards Project with Dr. Theodor Uzamere

Hello friends 👋

This week on Tech Tuesday, we sit down with Dr. Theodor Uzamere, a graduating neonatology fellow from Texas Children’s Hospital, to explore an inspiring project that brings creativity and compassion to the NICU bedside. Theodor introduces us to the Consult Cards — a thoughtful, low-tech innovation designed to support families navigating the overwhelming world of neonatal intensive care.

Rooted in his love for consults and desire to improve communication during high-stress conversations, Theodor created a deck of color-coded, parent-friendly flashcards that cover essential NICU topics: diseases, respiratory support, nutrition, imaging, and vocabulary. Drawing from his own study strategies and guided by feedback from NICU family focus groups, these cards aim to reduce anxiety, improve understanding, and foster meaningful engagement between families and the medical team.

We discuss the process of developing, evaluating, and iterating on the cards, and how Theodor hopes to expand their reach. More than just an educational tool, the Consult Cards empower families to participate actively in their baby’s care. If you’re passionate about patient-centered communication and innovation in neonatology, this conversation will move and motivate you. 

For collaboration opportunities, Theodor’s contact details are: theodoruzamere@gmail.com

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Short bio: Dr. Theodor Uzamere, is a neonatologist and fellow physician at Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston, Texas. He specializes in neonatal-perinatal medicine, focusing on the care of critically ill newborns. Dr. Uzamere earned his medical degree from Meharry Medical College School of Medicine and holds a Master of Health Science. He is board-certified in pediatrics and licensed to practice in Texas. His clinical training includes a residency in pediatrics and a fellowship in neonatal-perinatal medicine at Baylor College of Medicine. In addition to his clinical work, Dr. Uzamere is actively involved in research and education. He has presented at national conferences, including the 2024 AAP National Conference & Exhibition, where he shared insights on developing educational tools for prenatal consultations. His research interests include improving communication with families in the NICU and developing innovative educational resources for parents 

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The transcript of today's episode can be found below 👇

Ben Courchia (00:01.092)

Hello everybody, welcome back to the Incubator Podcast. are back here today for a new episode of Tech Tuesday. Daphne, how are you this morning?

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (00:10.724)

I'm doing really well. We love featuring fellows and we have a graduating fellow almost on his way out. And we have really been looking forward to this episode because we met Theodore like, it feels like a year ago now. So we've really been looking forward to this episode.

Theodor Uzamere (00:17.221)

Thank

Theodor Uzamere (00:25.477)

It does, it does.

Ben Courchia (00:30.948)

Yeah, mean, it's unusual for us to have Fellows on Tech Tuesday, especially now that Rupa has this special series for Fellows, but we snatched Theodore before she could establish herself. So we get to record with Theodore today. And he might actually stay tuned. He might make an appearance on Rupa's Fellows Friday. But Theodore, welcome to the podcast, and it's a pleasure to have you on.

Theodor Uzamere (00:51.855)

Absolutely.

Theodor Uzamere (00:56.859)

It's a pleasure to be here and I'll say it to you all at CHNC and I'll say it again just for everybody to hear. You all, I just want to thank you all for being an inspiration, right? Like a lot, there's a lot of us that like, that don't feel like we fit the mold when it comes to like the typical physician or typical neonatologist. And I think what you all have been able to do with the incubator podcast has been fantastic. And it's like an inspiration really to all of us.

Ben Courchia (01:03.8)

Yeah

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (01:04.646)

Oh, that's nice of you. Hmm. That's nice of you to say. OK, we're done. No, I'm just kidding.

Ben Courchia (01:16.708)

Ah, that means a lot. Thank you. Thank you, Theodore. So Theodore is a third-year fellow. Actually, I'm going to introduce you properly, Dr. Theodore Uzameri, who's a third-year fellow at Texas Children's Hospital. You're graduating fellow. You'll be joining the team at UT. And what we're here to talk about today is something that we had the chance to...

Theodor Uzamere (01:18.919)

You

Theodor Uzamere (01:29.531)

You

Ben Courchia (01:42.628)

at last year's CHNC Symposium. We met you and you had these little cards with you. And that's really what we're here to talk about. So can you tell us a little bit about what these are and what you're intending to do with this project?

Theodor Uzamere (02:00.924)

Absolutely, absolutely. like standing name right now, the console cards, that's just a name and a project that I'm very passionate about and came up with during my first year of fellowship. Just coming in, I knew I didn't want to do like the typical type of research like bench work or things that I've done in the past. I just wanted to kind of take the creative aspects of my life and meld them with what I love to do on a day to day. So I picked the research mentor, Dr. Sungren, amazing. we...

just kind of discuss where there were gaps in practice. So I love consults and I love, we call it the TLC service. So transport, labor and delivery and consults. So I love that service because not only can I go to deliveries, get my hands on, we also do consults. So I just always remember in residency thinking like, wow, we come into these rooms and we say, hey, these scary things are about to happen and we wanna prepare you for that.

And we unload on these mothers and fathers and then we say, do you have any questions? And then we walk away. And then we don't really see them again until we get into the NICU. So I thought there has to be a better way to do this. So as we were going through and discussing what a project might look like, I thought, you know, how do I study? Like when somebody comes to me and tells me like a lot of information, how do I kind of compartmentalize and make sure that these things are retained? And the first thing that came to mind was how I studied for step one, two, and three.

and flashcards played a significant role in that, whether they be digital flashcards or physical flashcards. So I thought, hey, Dr. Sunker, let's create flashcards for parents and not just something that we can show at the console, but something that can keep, their families continue to study. And that's kind of how the console cards were born. Yeah, yeah, so that's where we are right now. As we came forward, I'm like a, I'm not a great artist, but I started doodling and seeing what these console cards could look like.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (03:48.006)

Hmm.

Theodor Uzamere (03:54.011)

But I kind of stopped in my tracks and dr. Suckerman I thought you know what let's kind of get some feedback from the people who will actually be using these cards So I think that was a beautiful portion this became a two-part project during my fellowship The first part was meeting with our Nikki family advisory committee Getting some focus groups together and actually getting some parents input on what they would like so coming into it I wanted to you know do some BPD cards maybe like some cards with some vocabulary and it's nothing too crazy, but

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (04:16.646)

you know, do some BPD cards, maybe like some cards with some vocabulary, and it's nothing too crazy. But after we kind of emerged from these focus groups, we got this comprehensive set of cards with five sections, diseases, respiratory support, vocabulary.

Theodor Uzamere (04:22.293)

After we kind of emerged from these focus groups, we got this comprehensive set of cards with five sections, diseases, respiratory support, vocabulary, nutrition, and vocabulary.

Ben Courchia (04:34.828)

Very, very interesting. so can you tell us a little bit about, these truly like flashcards, like they're small? I mean, can you tell the audience like how big are they? like right now, I know you presented like a little box to us when we were at CHNC. How many cards do you have? Yeah, right there. Do you know how many cards are currently in that initial box and what is your plan moving forward?

Theodor Uzamere (04:44.398)

Absolutely.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah.

Theodor Uzamere (04:58.851)

Absolutely, so right now there are 35 cards in the box. We didn't want to do anything too robust, but the hope is to expand it into different specialties like nicureno, nicu cardiology, things like that. Like I said, they're divided into five sections. So the disease cards are blue. We have orange cards that are the imaging cards. Green cards are respiratory support. Red vocabulary and purple are nutrition.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (05:09.922)

I love that.

Ben Courchia (05:22.936)

The green cards are not the immigration green cards people I'm just saying.

Theodor Uzamere (05:25.366)

No, they're not.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (05:25.464)

No, totally not. And Theodore, why don't you pull out one of those cards and read us the front and the back so people can get a really good idea. I love that card. That's the perfect card to start with, I think. I was going to ask if you had a favorite card.

Theodor Uzamere (05:30.433)

Absolutely.

Theodor Uzamere (05:35.768)

Yeah, absolutely. This is actually, this this card is special to me. Cause as, cause actually this is special because coming into this project, my, we asked a couple of different questions. We thought, could this decrease parental anxiety surrounding the console and could this increase knowledge retention? These are the questions we started with. So going into it, we, we, we met these parents at the console or within 72 hours of the console.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (05:52.038)

Sure.

Theodor Uzamere (06:03.386)

We introduced to them the cards. They were randomized into whether they were gonna get the cards or not get the cards. Then we followed up about a week after their NICU admission and then close to discharge. We wanted to see if their anxiety scores decreased, like with this particular anxiety survey we used, and then whether they did better on the set of knowledge questions. So this intraventricular, I don't know if you're gonna see it, intraventricular hemorrhage card was really special to me because when I followed up with one of the fathers at the second visit,

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (06:08.24)

get the cards or

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (06:13.868)

huh.

Theodor Uzamere (06:32.562)

He came to me said, man, they actually told me that R32 weaker unfortunately has a great one hemorrhage. And, you know, that might not be the most common thing, but me and my wife were kind of reeling and we just didn't understand what was going to go on. And my first inclination was to go into Dr. Google and see, you know, how bad is this going to get? But I stopped myself. I took a look at the deck of cards you gave me. I pulled out the intraparticular hemorrhage card and it made us feel better. And I love that, right? So the disease cards are really important to me because

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (06:41.99)

Theodor Uzamere (07:00.433)

I think they are the most comprehensive. On the front, there's a picture and the description of what this disease is. But on the back, I think is where these cards shine. So there is a definition of what intra-ventricular hemorrhage is in layman's terms, common questions that they might have to ask their physician, key facts about intra-ventricular hemorrhage, and then key words that are tied to the red vocabulary cards. So that dad specifically honed into the common questions because

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (07:00.902)

think they are the most comprehensive. A picture and a description of what this disease is. But on the back, I think is where these cards kind of shine, right? So there is a definition of what intravenous image is in layman's terms. Common questions that they might have to ask their physician. Key facts about intravenous image and then key words that are tied to the bread croquette.

So that dad specifically holds on to the common question. Once again, we leave the room and we say, hey, do you have any questions? like, just told me I'm about to have a 25 week or you just told me that my kid has a great one hemorrhage. I literally don't even know to start. So looking at these cards gives them examples of common questions we have received from families with capacity. I love that. And I mean, that story is just everything, right? It goes to show that parents are.

Theodor Uzamere (07:28.94)

Once again, we leave the room and we say, do you have any questions? They're like, you just told me I'm about to have a 25 week or you just told me that my kid has a grade one hemorrhage. I literally don't even know where to start. So looking at these cards, it gives them examples of common questions we have received from families in the past.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (07:50.35)

looking for reliable information. And if we don't give it to them, they're going to find it somewhere else. And that may be good or bad information. You told us a little bit about your evaluation of the cards, pre and post evaluations. Any data from that that you want to share?

Theodor Uzamere (07:52.825)

Absolutely.

Theodor Uzamere (07:58.314)

Yeah.

Theodor Uzamere (08:09.023)

So we're finalizing the data now and what it's looking like is in both groups, the one group that received the car is the one that did it. There doesn't seem to be much of a difference, right, with anxiety and with knowledge retention. But I think what that allowed us to do is take a step back and say, do those kind of endpoints matter, right? Like, do we actually care if mothers and fathers know the difference between a grade four or grade one hemorrhage? So I think like,

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (08:25.574)

those kind of endpoints matter? Do we actually care? That's right.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (08:34.392)

I where we're moving to next is not only to expand the centers that these cars are being

Theodor Uzamere (08:35.625)

where we're moving to next is not only to expand like the centers that these cars are being used at to see if we can get more data, but asking different questions like parents perception of their care that they've received in the NICU, the quality of education they feel like they've received, their engagement in the team or how much they feel supported. These are questions I feel like are better, are actually the questions that we want the answers to when it comes to like giving parents information about their children.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (08:42.246)

Yeah, I agree. I think it was a tall order to ask your educational cards to make those kinds of impacts.

Theodor Uzamere (09:05.313)

Absolutely.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (09:12.078)

I mean, already from the stories you told now and you've told us before, it's obvious that these are impactful for parents. So I think that's really tremendous. You told us a little bit about what the future looks like. So then you'll have kind of organ specific packs. Okay.

Theodor Uzamere (09:32.601)

That's the hope. That's the hope. Initially, we didn't want to overwhelm parents. But one thing that I was actually surprised at during the focus groups, because we had a variety of parents that joined those focus groups. Some of them had kids with genetic disorders like Trisomy 18. Others had significant cardiac defects. And they were saying, hey, this is a good start. But what about me? You don't have a card about TGA. You don't have a card about Trisomy 21 or what that means for the anomalies associated with Trisomy 21.

And I said, wow, that's amazing. And that definitely would be the next step.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (10:07.27)

And tell me a little bit about, I'm sorry, I just totally lost my question. Ben, I know you have a question. I see you there.

Ben Courchia (10:16.866)

No, I would like to find out a little bit for the people who are looking at this and saying, hey, this is kind of neat. What's your distribution plan? Obviously, right now you have a prototype in hand. I'm going to ask the question, how can people get these in their NICUs tomorrow?

Theodor Uzamere (10:32.812)

absolutely. So tomorrow might be a little too early, right? I think right now that my main to ask is I want to I want to study this asking different questions and do that do this at different centers. I think we have a very diverse population here in Houston, but I want to see how this does in the Northeast and the West, things like that. And I think at this point, it would be great to get somebody to license these like whether, you know, El Sevier or Kaplan, things like that. that because my hope would be that hospitals and organizations.

Ben Courchia (10:35.252)

Hahaha

Theodor Uzamere (11:00.331)

would purchase these, but they would be provided to families for free, right? Like that would be the ideal thing.

Ben Courchia (11:04.385)

Yeah, yeah. I think so then at this point, it seems clear that you would like that you perceive that these cards have some some degree of room for improvement. And so I think it's important for people that to know that if there is an interest in maybe collaborating or being a test center, then people should reach out to you and maybe collaborate with you on on on the quality improvement initiative associated with this project.

Theodor Uzamere (11:26.334)

Absolutely.

Theodor Uzamere (11:31.52)

Yeah, absolutely. I would hope I can get, can give y'all my email and put them in the episode notes. Because I would love for people to reach out and if this is something that you would love to see in your center, I would love to collaborate with you to improve them. I think it was always a thought that we would continue having focus groups with our NICU Family Advisory Committee and continue to improve on these cards.

Ben Courchia (11:36.632)

Yeah, definitely.

Ben Courchia (11:49.634)

Yeah, and you will be in, by the time this episode air, you'll be in attending or you'll be close to being in attending. So if you're a fellow out there, if you're a fellow out there, then it's also an opportunity to work closely with junior faculty on a project and have this truly be one of, maybe one of your multiple scholarly activities, if not maybe your sole scholarly activity. something to think about. Daphna, were you able to remember what you were gonna ask? Great.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (11:52.186)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Theodor Uzamere (11:53.215)

Yeah, great.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (12:16.208)

You back to me. Well, you've kind of touched on it. My question was really how do you foresee units using this? Do you foresee that I have my individual stack and when I go to talk about a specific diagnosis, I can take that one card? Or it sounds like you think it's best for a parent to have the whole pack even knowing that they may not see all those diagnoses.

Theodor Uzamere (12:39.53)

Mm-hmm.

Theodor Uzamere (12:43.479)

Yeah, so right now, just because of money constraints, we do we didn't divvy up the cars based on gestation. But what we did do is we designed and printed like a guidebook. So a flashcard guidebook and it differentiated between three gestational like kind of groups. So like the 25 to 28, 28 to 32, 32 to 35. And based on what gestational group you fell in, we have cars that we recommend you look at. You're free to look at all of them, but we don't want to get you nervous if you're having a 35 week or

looking at like a neck or an intra-virtual hemorrhage card. But these things do happen and you do have them in case your child does experience those things. So the thought would be like there was to be a library of cards and as you're going to talk with this family, then you could hand put cards that you feel like are more relevant. I think the key here though is I think people have done studies similar to this in the past. Like there's Dr. Gillian, I think she did a pictograph or cards for decision-making kind of at the threshold of viability. met actually Dr., I think,

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (13:21.606)

So the sound will be like there will be a.

Theodor Uzamere (13:43.03)

I'm going to probably butcher her name. I'm so sorry, Dr. Odekel. I met her at CHNC and she actually did some imaging that was used at the time of the console. And I think the difference here is this space repetition aspect, right? Like my thought would be there would be a library of cards you bring to families during the console. They're allowed to keep them and they can kind of study them as they are going through their journey to NICU. We constantly have family members coming to the NICU saying like, what's going on? Like, I'm not really sure I'm understanding what's going on with my niece or my nephew or my grandchild.

you could hand them the card and say, hey, this is what they told me about today. So I think that just that longitudinal, that like spaced repetition, so that near at the end of their stay, they can say, hey, like I really felt like an integral part of this team.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (14:25.07)

I love that. And Theodore, tell me, why was it important to you to help families with this journey through the NICU? You could have picked any project. You're super talented. Your drawings are very good. You know, why this?

Theodor Uzamere (14:34.705)

Absolutely.

Theodor Uzamere (14:42.312)

Man, it's been a journey to here. think I'm Nigerian, right? So growing up, I had a little bit of a different upbringing. Like I never, there was never a moment where I thought I couldn't be a doctor, which was great, right? But I think there was moments where I felt like I wouldn't enjoy being a doctor. I didn't feel like I really felt fit the mold. I felt when, know, when in undergrad, when people were studying for the MCAT, I was studying for the MCAT, but I was also like planning events on campus or even in med school when people were studying for step one, you know, I was studying, but I was also like with one of my colleagues creating a fashion line and

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (15:10.63)

creating a fashion line and we used all the funds from that fashion line to fund MCAT books for kids who couldn't afford it. Amazing.

Theodor Uzamere (15:11.968)

We used all the funds from that fashion line to fund MCAT books for kids who couldn't afford it. So there was always this just creative aspect that I wanted to mesh with my profession. And I always thought I would have to keep those two things separate. So the idea came because I just said, you know what, coming into fellowship, I'm not a big fan of Benchwork. I'm not a huge fan of some of these other projects. Is there a way that I could mesh these two lives together? And then the console cars were kind of born.

I actually had a specific experience in residency that really inspired even my interest in NICU. I was on my capstone rotation and Dr. Patil was one of our attendings. One of the people who is training me here in fellowship. We went to speak to a mom who had heart failure and she was 25 weeks pregnant and they told us that she was gonna have to go for a cardiac surgery and there was a chance that she could go into labor. And it was just...

It was very difficult to speak with this mom because she wasn't speaking to anybody. When we came into the room, she was kind of looking out the window, didn't really want to speak with anybody. And I don't know what kind of gave me the courage to ask Dr. Patil could I speak? I don't know why she listened to me. I don't think I was like the smartest person in the room. She was a black woman, maybe because I am a black man, she was able to just connect with me in a different way. But just speaking to her on her level, showing her that...

This might be a very difficult decision to make. this actually might have been a 23 24 week or because she did have a decision to make per se and I told her that there was not a right or wrong decision here like there are some families that made this type of decision it was best for them family there was other families that went this other route and that was best for their family and just Talking to her on her level Opened her up by the end of the console. She was laughing with us. She wanted to move forward based on how we

spoke with her. And I think that was like the inspiration for wanting to improve the communication that we have with our patients specifically in the consults. just, thought it was really weird that, you know, decades, well, not even decades. I mean, we're not like really a super young profession, but we're still doing consults the same way where we're just kind of like talking at families and then walking out of the room. We're not really, it's not really standard to leave them with any information. And like I said, the next time they see us, like their child is born in the NICU.

Theodor Uzamere (17:28.669)

So that's kind of like where all of this kind of stemmed from, the road to these cars.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (17:33.818)

love that story and I'm not gonna, think what you've said is a slam dunk. I was just telling my husband this morning, know, we wonder why some parents ask too many questions and I wonder why some parents don't ask enough questions and you know, parents can never really get it quote unquote right. But how can they if we don't help them with that? And I think your cards do a really nice job of that. In particular,

Theodor Uzamere (17:47.386)

Yeah.

Theodor Uzamere (17:55.251)

Yeah.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (18:00.086)

those questions about what to ask. You know, what do you need to know? Because they don't know what questions to ask. And it helps them, instead of us just answering those questions ahead of time, like you said, really helps them be a part of the conversation. And that's what they want. I mean, your story of opening up that mom just by, you know, asking her about herself and, you know, they want to be seen as

Theodor Uzamere (18:06.59)

Yeah.

Theodor Uzamere (18:10.547)

You

Theodor Uzamere (18:15.312)

Absolutely.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (18:26.864)

people and part of the decisions that are happening for their babies. So I think you've done that in a very eloquent way. And we keep saying, this is a simple solution. It's not a simple solution. It took you a lot, a lot of work. It is low tech, but I think it's even more important that we're highlighting those things because everything's moving to high tech, AI, blotty, blotty. And sometimes we're missing some of those.

Theodor Uzamere (18:48.302)

It is, yeah.

Daphna Yasova Barbeau, MD (18:52.76)

humanistic solutions that our patients and our families are really looking for. So I really appreciate what you've done with that.

Theodor Uzamere (19:00.686)

I appreciate you all.

Ben Courchia (19:02.05)

Yeah, and I think to me what's an important takeaway from this project is that it offers what people describe in conversational studies, that it offers strings for parents to pull on. Sometimes they'll talk to a physician and they'll understand maybe the first layer of information because that's already pretty much a lot. But then they may not have the opportunity because it's such a short moment in time.

Theodor Uzamere (19:17.17)

Hmm.

Ben Courchia (19:27.886)

to actually go in the depth and this card potentially opens up the possibility saying, hey, I should have, I should, I'm wondering about neurodemental outcomes or I am wondering about the side effect of the medications that we use. So I think it's, it's an opportunity to keep the conversation going and the opportunity for parents actually to come back to the table. I am always very frustrated with the fact that I tell parents, hey, if any more questions do come up in the future, please call me back, I'll come back. But very rarely do they call you back. And I think it's because they don't really have the material to sort of,

Theodor Uzamere (19:34.802)

Mm-hmm.

Theodor Uzamere (19:53.862)

Mm-mm.

Ben Courchia (19:56.812)

reflect over the conversation you've had with them and the opportunity to think about other topics. So I think it's a phenomenal project. I think it's inspirational and congratulations, Theodore.

Theodor Uzamere (20:10.073)

I appreciate y'all, I really do.

Ben Courchia (20:12.196)

We're going to put your contact information in the show notes and then we will give the opportunity to people to collaborate with you if that's what they want. In the meantime, best of luck on your new attending position and best of luck to you and your family.

Theodor Uzamere (20:28.86)

Thank you so much. Light at the end of the tunnel. Thank you.

Ben Courchia (20:31.276)

Take care.