Celebrating 100 Episodes

- This is Lab Medicine Rounds, a curated podcast for physicians, laboratory professionals, and students. Today we're recording a very special episode to celebrate our 100th episode here at Lab Medicine Rounds.

We're rounding with the full podcast production team, which includes myself as your host, Justin Kreuter, the Bow Tie Bandit of Blood, Transfusion Medicine pathologist and Assistant Professor of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology, Rick Andresen, producer and director, Melissa Peterson, MBA, Senior education specialist, and Heidi Zunker, MS, And education program manager all here at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, to share their experience,

these behind the scenes stories on starting this educational podcast and reflecting on past episodes. It's exciting that it's our hundredth episode. I think we should start it off by finding out how did the podcast start out?

So why don't you guys tell us what was the kind of genesis, how did this all start? - So it really birthed from a needs assessment that we sent out to clients of Mayo Clinical Laboratories. And we found out that people wanted on-demand content, but, like shorter amounts of it. And we had never done a podcast before. So we thought, you know, this might be a great medium for us to try in terms of providing education to our clients.

And we were told that in order to make a podcast happen, you need a good host. And so right away, Melissa and I were talking, and this is back when we were still in the office and we're just like, Dr. Kreuter, like it has to be. So we reached out to him and thankfully he agreed,

and the rest is history. So yeah, - We're very grateful that you jumped on board so quickly too, by the way, because when we were kind of doing our research and meeting with other departments of education throughout Mayo who have done some podcasting, we were trying to get benchmarks and, you know, see what we needed to do. So hosting from, I think we even met with Rick a couple of times ahead of time being like, you know, you've recorded some of these, like, what do we need to know?

And from there we were able to just kind of piece it together. - Wow. I'm super glad that you guys had that kind of needs assessment came out that way. I think, I'm trying to think back about what year that was because you know, I think, you know, we kind of knew what podcasting was. Rick, you were recording some, I was certainly listening to some podcasts at the time. And yeah, when the ask came together, then the opportunity to hang out with you two was super cool.

'cause maybe what our audience doesn't understand is that I've, I've been have the privilege of hanging out and, and working with Melissa and Heidi for several years about education projects. Their, their, their hearts also beat for medical education. So I was, I was super thrilled how this kind of came together, which then kind of makes us kind

of talk about like, how does this work around the podcast all, all come together and, and kind of what's most surprising about it. Maybe we can kinda tell that story for our audience, kind of put things front and center. Heidi, you wanna start us off? - Sure. Typically the process for us is kind of, we meet once a month with Dr. Kreuter and brainstorm different topics. Maybe there's trending things happening at Mayo Clinic or in the world, and we really wanna cover those topics.

So then from there, Dr. Kreuter takes it and invites the consultants or the guests to the podcast. And I think the most surprising thing for me is how much time it does take from start to finish to complete the whole process. So - Yeah, I would say regarding the scheduling, it was, I mean, I've scheduled things on consultant's, calendars and stuff before, but man, some of your guys' calendars are insane.

So it, it's really difficult to try to find a time that works for you, for the guest, that Rick is available to do the recording so he can get the editing and things done. So I mean, I think that for me has been really like eye-opening and just having, you know, our questions for the speakers and the guest speakers laid out, kind of giving everybody a chance to him and haw over it ahead of time, which is really nice.

But then sometimes I think people are just so off the cuff sometimes it, it just comes out so conversational and so fluid and I'm like, this was amazing. I couldn't do that. - And my, my job actually doesn't start until the recording. So, and then after, so basically once the recording is done, I take it and then I take it back in, in the professional terms, I clean it up and basically all that really involves is taking out ums and ahs and pauses. And sometimes our guests will misspeak

or the.y'll start a sentence and change in the middle of it. So I'll, I'll clean it all up. I add music, I add our mid-roll, and then I send it back. Usually that takes anywhere between a week or so. And then I'll send it back to Heidi and Melissa and then they can review it and then it's up to them to post it. - Yeah. So from there we take those files and we get closed captioning for YouTube.

We post them both to transistor and YouTube and make sure everything's published on Mayo Clinic Lab's website as well. So, - And the social media. - Yes. Yep. We do create little promo ads so that we can promote the podcast on social media. And Dr. Kreuter has a great Twitter following, as you all know. So - It's been kind of cool to see how that's been growing. Right. In the sense that this podcast originally truly was a podcast.

Actually nobody saw us. Yeah. What the audience doesn't know is this is actually our first time being here in the studio where this was actually birthed. Right. And, and we were always just recording audio only I was, you know, very much looking at notes and, and looking at the people we're interviewing. But then, then with Covid we really kind of transitioned to, to virtual, which then kind of opened up the opportunity since we had video to get on YouTube.

Right. Which kind of, you know, I guess, did that change anybody's work process? No. Whenever we do a recording, I record the audio and video together and then basically I'll make two files. I'll make an audio file only, and then I'll make a video file as well for Heidi and Melissa to post on online. So - You always did that? Always. - I Didn't realize that I always did that. Only because some of my other customers here at Mayo who do podcasts take the video part of it to use for promotion.

So they'll take a clip of the video and they'll have a little clip of an expert talking about something

and they'll use that to promote it. And they'll put that on Instagram or they'll put that on LinkedIn or they'll put it somewhere so they can get more eyeballs on it. Sure. Yeah. So now from your standpoint, what do you have to do to prepare for one of their podcasts? Yeah, it is a great question. One that's changed in the very beginning. I remember we'd invite experts and so since we were inviting an expert in a lot of times was, you know, kind of, we'd love to have you on your podcast.

Like what are some, some, you know, questions that I could ask you, you know, kind of deferring to their expertise of course. And I think those first couple asks, of course we had people accept, but there was a lot more work it seemed like, because, you know, number one, you're asking them to do some work to put together the questions. And then, you know, sometimes people don't actually post maybe the best questions or ones that kind of lead to a story.

Or even just thinking about our audience particularly, right? So physicians, laboratory professionals and students. Sometimes we would have to kind of tweak those questions so there'd be back and forth. And after doing that, in the beginning, I sort of came to appreciate, let me just try and, and then I started where I would actually invite somebody to the podcast and I would just propose four questions. And I would say, Hey, here's a draft, feel free to edit.

And I have to say that probably 99% of people just say, those are great, right? Let's, let's go. And, and every now and then you get people that actually do wanna tweak and something that works great.

But that seriously, I think has cut down on, I think, at least for me, the amount of work I do going into it in the beginning. And then also I think from the getting somebody to commit and accept the invitation, I feel like we get a little bit of a higher success rate. And so with all these kinds of, the learning process of us kind of starting from scratch, really not knowing much about podcasts than that, kind of, let's take a step back and think about what was the overall goal?

What was kind of the, the mission statement of the podcast when we, when we started? - Yeah. So I remember brainstorming this. Do you remember that meeting Dr. Kreuter? We sat in a room. - I remember the room. I remember the table. Yeah, I think we had a whiteboard. - Yes. And we were just like throwing ideas out there. And we landed on connecting lab medicine with the clinical practice through insightful conversations or educational conversations.

So, and really I would say another huge goal is every episode Dr. Kreuter does such an awesome job of, of reaching each one of those target audiences. So laboratory professionals, physicians and students. And he always has like great takeaways. And so it's, yeah, that's kind of, yeah, the goal. And I will - Say, I mean, coming from like Heidi and my perspective, we don't have the laboratory background. You know, we have more of like the business professional side of things.

So being in those meetings with you and just the way you draft those questions and the way you ask people things, I think it's really easy to follow and understand even for someone like me who doesn't have the background, the medical background. So, I mean, a lot of times the information is over my head, but a lot of times I actually, I'm like, oh, okay, I understand this better now than what I did before. - I have to say actually for all three of you, I think that it's the ultimate compliment.

Like when we finished doing a recording and you guys are like, wow, that was really great. Right? Because then I, I know that, right? We've, you know, with your experience Rick, in, in listening to so many podcasts and you know, Melissa and Heidi, from your experience in understanding medical education, what seems to resonate with people, it's kind of like the ultimate compliment of okay, we've told a good story and and packaged it up well.

Right, right. And for me it's always, at least the ones that have the greatest impact are the ones for students.

Because you could tell they're at the beginning of their career and you're giving them advice or telling them, here's things that these other people have done in their careers. And I always feel like that those mean the most because you're basically helping the future generation of physicians. So we've done a hundred episodes, that's a lot to be together for four years or however many years we've been together.

So what are your guys like, takeaways, funny things, things that Dr. Kreuter does that annoys you or that we always look forward to? - Well, I know, 'cause we've talked about this before. So Rick, why don't you start with yours? - So, because I have to edit these and I basically sit through the whole recording the first time, and then I sit through it again as I go in and re-edit everything.

There are certain phrases that Dr. Kreuter likes to use that keep coming up, and I always get a little chuckle with them. The the one that always says is, is it makes my heart go pitter patter. He always says that one. The other ones I like is, I'm kind of curious that, that one you say a lot when you're interviewing and then let's unpack that or, or let's dive into that. Those are a couple other things that I, I hear frequently when I'm doing the record, when I'm doing the editing.

Well, you didn't miss a beat there. - He's been thinking about it for a while. Yeah, well, a hundred episodes, that's a lot. Well, sorry Heidi, but I mean, to that point we've kind of had chuckles at your expense from it and, but we've included you so you're in on it too. But I think some of the other stuff was just sometimes someone would give a really great answer and something that you hadn't thought of that they were gonna respond with and you go genius.

Or like, you have some of these like phrases and we kind of made it into a game. We're like, oh, tally won for Genius. Yep. We'll be behind the scenes chatting each other on teams and we're just like, oh, there comes heart goes pitter patter down. - I have to say, right? Like, that's something that, like you say, I, you guys have brought me in on that and that's been one of the cool things for me as a host, right?

Like, you know, life is busy and a lot of times I'm coming from various clinical things and, and I think when we kind of come together and usually we kind of joke about those things when we're about to start recording, I think that for me is my kind of like, you know, taking a beat, center, getting, getting my game face on. So to level the playing field now. - Yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, that's right. We all know, - We know Rick gives some great pointers to our presenters.

So that's how we kind of get them settled in. Right. And so as our audience maybe interested

in podcasting or just curious of what some of that prep goes, which I know part of it is probably getting them to feel comfortable. I'm kind of curious if you'd share for our audience how you do that. Absolutely. So a lot of people, especially medical professionals sometimes are great in front of their peers giving presentations, but the instant you stick a camera in their face or a microphone, it's, it's unnatural. It's a little weird. So I always try to get them to relax a little.

So the first thing I always tell them when we do a mic check to make sure I'm getting good audio levels is I'll say something like, tell me what you had for breakfast, or tell me about your favorite vacation you've taken. And that gets them talking about something unrelated to what's about to happen. And so, and sometimes if I can tell they're really nervous, I'll add something. Oh, really? What was skiing like at Vaylor? You know, something just to get them talking off camera.

I always make sure that their video looks good, so I make sure that there's nothing behind them that they wouldn't want people to see. We have had a few instances where people had their dirty laundry on their bed behind them, or they had a bookshelf with maybe some pictures of them goofing off, you know, on vacation or with their kids or maybe a book title that they didn't want people to know about.

So I always make sure that they, you know, take a look around and make sure there's nothing around that you don't want people to see, because people will, will look and see what's behind them. And then after that it's really just, you know, take a deep breath and, and try to relax and try to have fun with it. So I know for me that sparked some fun memories. Yes, - Sure. Does - Do you guys have a favorite memory? Keep in mind, right audience? This is during Covid times.

As, as you know, we don't have any professors with their laundry in their offices. But - Yes, I, okay, do you guys, this is by far one of my favorites, and if he's listening to this, he will know it's him, but that is okay because he's awesome. I remember when we first transitioned to recording these at home via Zoom, you know how you can pick your background in Zoom? We had one consultant come on, and he looked like he was driving a spaceship. And I'm like, oh, okay.

So I kind of recommended you, you know, you might want to change it to like a Mayo Clinic background or maybe Mayo Clinic Laboratories. And he's like, oh, okay. So he's like, I'll find the right one. And I remember he scanned through and he is like, yep, this is the one. And it was Darth Vader in the background, and I'm like, oh, nope, nope, he's serious. This is what we're rolling with. So I just, oh yeah, it was great. How about you, Melissa? Oh gosh. - Well, didn't one of the physicians have

his mic in his hand? Oh - Yeah. - That, that is my personal favorite because I feel like you were saying, well, yeah, one of the things you say when we're prepping is kind of like, oh, it's usually like, do you have a headset mic? Because you know, when you got a headset mic, no matter how you turn your face, like the audio level is gonna be the same. And this particular attending didn't have one of those. And, and so he said, oh yeah, no problem.

I'll, I'll, you know, hold it right here, you know, right in the center of my chest and I'll talk. And so we're like, okay. And we get in and like, you know, question one, tell me a story, and all of a sudden the mic is going out and it's going in and I, you know, you, you almost like think that this, this person is like playing the trombone or something. I, and I just, I think I held it all eggs. I was just like thinking, oh man, Rick, Rick's gonna be sitting there.

I had to reverse engineer every time he pulled it away. I'd have to bring the levels up and when he brought it back, I'd have to bring him down. - Well, and I mean, it's a podcast and you're trying to make it, I mean, it's not live, but you're trying to make it flow and things do happen. I mean, there was what, one episode two where one of the consultants had a headset and every time he would start talking about the podcast and like try to answer one of your questions,

his mic would cut out completely and it would just go silent. Yeah. And so then we'd finally like, like, okay, stop, stop. We're not, we're not hearing you. Right. And then all of a sudden it would start working and he is like, you can't hear me. I'm like, well now we can. But then he'd start talking about the podcast and giving his responses and it would cut out again. - Yeah. So all of those are great stories and yeah, always fun to have. So let's talk about, now we've done a hundred of these.

What do you think is different from when we started the first one that we did here in this studio to the 99th one that we've just finished? - Okay. I'm just gonna call it out because I can't help it. Dr. Kreuters's hair. Can we just talk about that? - Are - You talking about my covid project? - I mean, no facial hair whatsoever. It wasn't long when we first started, you know, then I think it was the long hair and then the beard appeared. It was just all the things.

So I feel like, you know, we might just have to show a progression of that because - Oh, definitely. That was also one of the things that we would always laugh about. Like, did you see Dr. Kreuter's hair today? Like, we haven't seen him in a month. I know, like it has grown a lot. Yeah. - Yeah. I had, I had to, for the audience, I had to trim the, the beard once I started to kind of get in the way of the bow tie, so the bow type bandit.

And people would just see me reach for my, - Yeah, I think, ah, something else that changed a lot just from the progression of COVID. You know, when we started here we had our teleprompters going, so you could look into the camera, you could read the intro and the outro. That kind of all changed when Covid came too. And everybody was just kind of on their own screens. Right?

So just kind of trying to remind everybody, like, okay, if, if you have your talking points, that's great, keep those, but put them maybe closer to the camera for you. Otherwise you're looking here, but we're over here. So just trying to line that kind of just like those small little details that you don't really think of right away that now seem, you know, pretty intuitive to us. - But - Yeah. Yeah.

I think for me, that reminds me of, again, one of these things about recording in a studio versus how we transitioned to over Zoom. It was like, in the studio, I think we were pretty much bound to, we could only record people that were here in Rochester, Minnesota. Right? I do distinctly remember doing one pre covid interview where somebody was remote, but I was here in the studio. And I have to say like, that was super challenging because I couldn't see them.

And so that was like the one interview where I was constantly interrupting them or they were interrupting me because that sort of, that, the visual cues of somebody who is about to speak not present. And so that's another way, like this transition has been really good.

Because as, as everybody knows, we've been able to get a lot of guests from, you know, internationally, we've been able to bring in a lot of students and talk with them from a lot of different places. And that, that's been a really cool way I think this podcast has, has changed is it's been a lot more welcoming, open and got, got a lot more diversity. Right. Yeah. All right. So we've, it should be a milestone that we've hit a hundred, which is great. So now let's talk about the next hundred.

What do you see Dr. Kreuter for the coming podcasts in the future? Well, I think, you know, like we've said, I think the important thing for this podcast is that we're putting together these interesting stories and sharing these perspectives. So I think that going forward, we want to lean into this diversity that we have.

And to say that it's also a challenge because we've tried to reach out to some people and invite them onto the podcast where I think people think, oh, you know, you know, why me? Like, wouldn't you rather have, you know, like particularly when we've even tried to reach out, sometimes Allied Health is kind of felt like, well, there should be a physician that's on there. It's like, well, no, we really want that perspective in the mix.

I have to say, our students that we've interviewed, some of them I've been able to reach out to, but a lot of them have been students that have been here and rotated and, and proposed the idea.

So I think maybe as we talk about leaning into the diversity, interviewing people from different places, I encourage the audience, you know, if, if you know, we can please reach out to us if you're interested in sharing your story, your perspective on some aspect that again, bridges that, that clinical practice and the, and the laboratory practice. And I think, you know, we'll continue doing this process of bringing out these perspectives and, and these stories. And what about for you guys?

What do you think next a hundred episodes? - Well, I would just like to kind of chime in on what Dr. Kreuter just mentioned, is that for anyone listening, if you do get our emails that we send out when the episodes go live, you'll see a little link at the bottom for a quick little survey. And if you have like thoughts or ideas or suggestions on things that you, as the audience want to see, we encourage you to click there and fill that stuff out.

We check it regularly and we would just love to hear

what you guys all have to say about it. - Yeah, good, good call out. I would just say I'm just excited to see what the next a hundred episodes, you know, like from when we started day one, I definitely didn't foresee the future of where we are today. I mean, it, it's been a fun journey and probably one of my favorite projects that we have in education right now. So yeah, that's, thanks to you guys. - Ditto. I mean this, this team is a joy.

And I just wanna say hat tip for, you know, getting this group that has done so much work from behind the scenes and bringing up front, this has been wonderful to do this reflection with each of you. Yeah, I agree. So we've been rounding with the full production crew of lab medicine rounds. So from all of us involved in the show, all four of us, we'd like to thank you for your support and for joining us to celebrate this fun milestone of our 100th episode.

And if you have any suggestions for the show, we invite you to send your thoughts via email to MCL education@mayo.edu. And lastly, if you've enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe until our next rounds, we encourage you to continue to connect lab medicine and the clinical practice through insightful conversations.