AAEM Resident and Student Association Podcast · American Academy of Emergency Medicine / RSA

EMpower: Street Medicine with Dr. Theresa Nguyen and Alana Moore

·36 min·2 clips

Dr. Nguyen says street medicine means "bringing care to the homeless population, no matter where they are."

Clara Pavezzi-Krieger welcomes listeners back to the RSA podcast and sets up the series as a place where humanity meets medicine. Anantha Singaraj joins her, and together they introduce the third episode in the social EM series. The topic is street medicine. They bring in Dr. Teresa Nguyen, an emergency physician at Loyola and a medical co-director of Loyola Street Medicine, along with Alana Moore, a second-year medical student and co-street runs director of the Miami Street Medicine Program. Dr. Nguyen starts by talking about her background and the work she does in Maywood, Illinois. She describes holding several roles at once, including directing the Center for Community and Global Health. From there the conversation settles into what street medicine actually asks of clinicians. It is not just about treating a complaint. It is about understanding what stands between a person and the care plan that looks simple on paper. The speakers talk through the limits of algorithmic thinking when someone is living on the streets. A recommendation can be correct and still miss the mark if the person cannot get transportation, food, or a safe place to rest. That is a big part of why the episode stays focused on practical barriers. Dr. Nguyen and Alana both return to trust as the starting point. They describe meeting people where they are and trying to set them up for success in the ways that matter most. That can mean wound care supplies. It can mean antibiotics when appropriate. It can mean making sure a follow-up visit is actually reachable. It can also mean remembering that someone may not be able to wait for an arranged ride if they have not eaten. Alana gives a medical-student view of how easy it is to miss those realities when training pushes you to move quickly from complaint to plan. She points out that a patient is not only a patient, and that background, fear, and past experiences with health care shape whether advice will land. The conversation is warm, earnest, and clearly advocacy-minded. It keeps circling back to autonomy, dignity, and the small choices that turn outreach into real help. Near the end, the tone shifts toward one of the episode's clearest human moments. Dr. Nguyen shares a story about helping connect someone to housing and about the emotional weight of not being able to help everyone. That story lands as a reminder that street medicine is built on limited moments that can still change a person's path. The episode closes by thanking the guests and pointing listeners toward the next social EM topic.

As heard by us

Street medicine, told through trust, access, and the small logistics that change care.

Street medicine is treated here as care that starts with the next real obstacle, not with a neat theory. Dr. Nguyen and Alana Moore keep circling back to trust, autonomy, food, transportation, and wound care, which makes the episode feel grounded rather than lofty.

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Why you'd press play

For when you want a grounded look at care that starts outside the clinic.

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