BCMS Medical Record Fall 2020 - 52

M e d i c a l R ec o r d F e a t u r e

Welcome New Members
Olapeju Simoyan, MD, MPH, BDS, FAAP, FASAM
Berks County and the Caron Treatment
Centers clients are fortunate to have Dr.
Simoyan as a member of the healthcare
team in our community, and the Berks
County Medical Society welcomes her
support for our profession through her
membership.
To get to know Dr. Simoyan a little
better, we asked her to respond to the
following questions:
Describe the focus of your practice
and any areas of special interest/
expertise.
I am an addiction medicine specialist
with primary training in family medicine.
Prior to medical school, I had training in
dentistry and public health, so I am board
certified in addiction medicine, family
medicine and dental public health.

D

r. Olapeju Simoyan is an
Addiction Medicine specialist
who joined the Caron Treatment
Centers earlier this year as the founding
Director of Medical Research. She is
board certified in Family Medicine and
Dental Public Health in addition to
Addiction Medicine. Prior to joining
Caron, Dr. Simoyan was a founding
faculty member of the Geisinger
Commonwealth School of Medicine
and Program Director of the Geisinger
Marworth Addiction Medicine Fellowship.
Her first professional degree was a
Bachelor of Dental Surgery (equivalent
of DDS) from the University of Ibadan,
Ibadan, Nigeria to be followed by a
Master of Public Health from the Johns
Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
and then she earned her MD from Penn
State College of Medicine, Hershey, PA.
Her post-graduate training included an
internship in Psychiatry/Family Medicine
at University of Pittsburgh Medical
Center/Western Psychiatric Institute and
Clinic and a residency at Penn State/The
Good Samaritan Hospital, Lebanon, PA in
Family and Community Medicine.	

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www.berkscms.org

What has brought you to
Berks County?
I was hired as the inaugural Medical
Director of Research at Caron Treatment
Centers in Wernersville. I already had a
long-standing interest in the possibility
of working at Caron because of their
adolescent program, since I have a special
interest in working with this population.
Prior to moving here, I was program
director for the addiction medicine
fellowship at Geisinger Marworth. I was
also a member of the founding faculty of
the Geisinger Commonwealth School of
Medicine.

If you could change one thing about
the current practice environment,
what would it be?
The politicization of public health,
especially with respect to the current
pandemic, is extremely disheartening and
frustrating. I really wish that health care
would be treated as a basic human right
and that politics would not be allowed to
interfere with public health.
Are you involved in any nonprofit/
community groups at this time?
I am on the board of directors of
Mission Street Recovery, whose mission
is to provide residential services for single
mothers battling addiction and their
children in Scranton, PA.
I am also on the advisory board of
"REACH" (Recognizing and Eliminating
disparities in Addiction through Culturally
informed Healthcare), a program of
the American Academy of Addiction
Psychiatry (AAAP), in collaboration with
Yale School of Medicine, to mentor and
cultivate culturally responsive fellows and
trainees, who are equipped to address
healthcare inequities in addiction.
I also support a hospital revitalization
project, a music school and a drug
rehabilitation program, all in Nigeria. In
the past, I have been involved in medical
mission projects in Nigeria and Haiti, in
addition to serving on the boards of some
of the sponsoring organizations.

What do you find most rewarding
about being a physician?

I have also worked with children
and youth in various settings, and enjoy
mentoring and giving career talks.

Being a physician has allowed me
to combine my interests in teaching,
mentoring and research while caring for
patients. Even though my current work
is focused on addiction medicine, my
training in family medicine and public
health enabled me to appreciate the
need for a comprehensive, collaborative
approach to clinical medicine and
healthcare in general.

I was born into a diplomatic family, the
third of six children. My parents had three
daughters and three sons in that order. We
were born in four different countries on
three continents. (My second sister and
I were born in Washington, DC, but we
didn't grow up there.) I liked music as a

Please tell us a little about your
family and the activities you enjoy
outside of work.
http://www.berkscms.org
BCMS Medical Record Fall 2020

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