things out and feeling so energized.”
Being someone who never shies away from a little road trip, she set out for the University of California San Francisco Medical Center in 2018 to complete her adolescent medicine fellowship.
“ In medicine, we have our evidence-based practices and clinical care guidelines, but there’ s also an art to what we do, and every institution has its own approach to medicine. You learn different skill sets and ideas. I was always open to going wherever I thought I’ d get the best training, and at the time there were only about 20 training programs across the country, most of which take one person per year. I felt like San Francisco met my goals of learning how to provide comprehensive primary care for adolescents and also different niche areas like substance use, reproductive health, eating disorder care.”
Over the next three years in training, she knew her next stop would be somewhere that really needed her help. Having such fond memories of Louisville, and missing the city and the people, she reached out to Norton Children’ s, and they just so happened to be looking for someone with her exact skill set.
“ They were really supportive of bringing me on board and it was cool because they didn’ t have anyone doing some of the clinical care that I do. I was able to define my job and think about what kind of services I wanted to build for teens.”
Dr. Badal is currently the only adolescent medicine physician in Louisville and one of just two in the state. But that doesn’ t bother her, and in fact, she embraces it.
“ So many of my colleagues provide really great care to teens. But for teens that are really struggling with certain high-risk behaviors or really difficult diagnoses, being that go-to person with extra level of training and expertise to help guide their clinical care is what I love. I don’ t mind being my own little‘ N of I.’”
( left) Dr. Badal speaking at Johns Hopkins All Children’ s Hospital( where she completed her pediatrics residency) in St. Petersburg, Florida;( right) Dr. Badal with ULSOM Dean Dr. Jeffrey Bumpous.
Currently doing outpatient care, she sees patients at the Novak Center as well as serves as the Co-Director of the Norton Children’ s Eating Disorders Program. She said she enjoys working at a highneeds clinic where they do a lot of wrap-around services and social determinants of health screening, with advocacy at the center of their work. She also serves as the physician lead at Maryhurst, providing primary care for teens while they’ re at the facility. Every day, she sees so much of the intersection of mental and physical health. During her fellowship training, she really began to understand some of the difficult challenges that patients with eating disorders face.
“ There is a lot of stigma, in both medicine and culture, and a lot of misunderstanding about what is going on for them. I was really able to start to understand that it can be an overlooked population by many medical providers because we don’ t get a ton of experience with it. It’ s this interesting diagnosis that doesn’ t live in psychiatry and doesn’ t live in physical medicine. It’ s a mental health challenge that has real world medical complications.”
She has a unique situation in that not all of the patients who come to see her necessarily want to get better. But she works to build that relationship over time, allowing them to trust that she is there to help them.
“ Especially with my eating disorder patients, like people with anorexia, they don’ t have insight into the severity of their illness and think they’ re doing just fine when they’ re really sick. Sometimes we only see very sick patients or patients who can be very resistant to treatment if it feels like there’ s no hope for them. Families can feel hopeless. I tell the families: my patients love and hate me. They don’ t like what I have to say, and they hate coming to see me, but that’ s because I’ m challenging their disorder because I want them to get
( continued on page 40)
May 2025 39