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Get Ready for a Powerful Message

This year’s Opening General Session is a must-attend event that will change the way you approach your relationship with your patients and will elevate the way you practice, leaving an indelible mark on those you treat and making audiologists stand out from the rest.

Abraham Verghese, MD, MACP
AAA 2024 Keynote Speaker
General Session and Keynote Speaker Sponsored by:

Thursday, April 18, 10:15am–12:00pm
Earn 0.1 CEUs

Get Your Pre-Signed Copy from the Author!

Dr. Verghese’s pre-signed book, The Covenant of Water, will be on sale in the HearTECH Expo (inside the main entrance) on Thursday, April 18, 12:00-3:00 pm (following his keynote presentation).

Keynote Speaker: Abraham Verghese, MD, MACP

Offered only at AAA 2024, Abraham Verghese, MD, MACP, best-selling novelist and renowned speaker, will take our main stage with his talk, A Doctor’s Touch.

During A Doctor’s Touch, Dr. Verghese will discuss how modern medicine is in danger of losing a powerful, old-fashioned tool—human touch. In his talk, Dr. Verghese will argue that it is time to refocus on the doctor-patient relationship and its foundation in the physical exam that builds trust between the caregiver and the patient. It puts the patient at the center of care and allows the doctor to use their most power diagnostic tool—the human hand. It’s the ritual that grounds Dr. Verghese’s vision of humanistic medicine in the modern age:  care grounded in caring and the sanctity of the doctor-patient relationship.  Learn more from Dr. Verghese during this critically important talk.

Dr. Verghese, himself, is living with hearing loss and will also share insights from his own personal journey making this a particularly relevant and individualized presentation for AAA attendees only. 

More About Dr. Abraham Verghese 

Abraham Verghese, MD, MACP, is professor and Linda R. Meier and Joan F. Lane provostial professor and vice chair for the Theory and Practice of Medicine at the School of Medicine at Stanford University. He is also a best-selling author and a physician with a reputation for his focus on healing in an era where technology often overwhelms the human side of medicine. 

Dr. Veghese’s book, Cutting for Stone, published in 2009, became a literary phenomenon, selling over 1.5 million copies in the United States alone and remaining on the New York Times bestseller list for over two years. His most recent novel, The Covenant of Water is an instant New York Times best-seller and an Oprah’s Book Club selection.  

He received the Heinz Award in 2014 and was awarded the National Humanities Medal, presented by President Barack Obama, in 2015.  In the White House Citation, it was noted Dr. Verghese was receiving the award “for reminding us that the patient is the center of the medical enterprise.  His range of proficiency embodies the diversity of humanities; from his efforts to emphasize empathy in medicine, to his imaginative renderings of the human drama.” 

Dr. Verghese is the co-host of the podcast, Medicine and the Machine, and has given a celebrated TED Conference talk focusing on the patient-physician relationship which has yielded over 2 million views.

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