Class of 2000 graduate Nirav Shah spoke to students on Jan. 24 for the Maroon Mentor speaker series, hosted by the Maroon Key Society, about his career path with economics and health care, and choosing between two passions. He shared with students that it’s perfectly fine to not have a straight career path.
Dr. Shah is the medical director of quality innovation and clinical practice analytics, and of infectious disease research at the NorthShore University Health System. He is also a clinical assistant professor at the University of Chicago School of Medicine.
Dr. Shah’s expertise in diseases, analytics, informatics and digital health guided his talk about his job during the event.
“I was very interested in science, all kinds of sciences, and I think I was very idealistic,” Dr. Shah said. “I think a lot of you guys are probably very idealistic. I had just been talking with some of you guys when I last was here a few months back and I think that provoked me to think about what do I want to do with my life, where do I want to go? And I wasn’t completely sure and I decided I would look into medicine, but also look into econ.”
Dr. Shah discussed different approaches to a career he took, from applying to Doctors Without Boarders to building clinical trial infrastructure at NorthShore Health System. Dr. Shah explained that his career path was never a straight path, and he always wanted a mix of different areas and careers.
“I was moving away from kind of practicing at an individual level to thinking more globally,” he said. “How do we manage large populations of patients, how do we make a larger impact? So I kept going down this path of not really knowing what I want to be when I grow up.”
