New to the UT Physicians team, Jason K. Au, MD, pediatric urologist, has a family history of helping others.
“I decided to become a physician early on in my childhood because of my father. He practices internal medicine,” said Au, who is also an assistant professor in the Department of Pediatric Surgery at McGovern Medical School at UTHealth. “Hearing him talk about the way he helped patients shaped my childhood and desire to pursue medicine.”
After high school, Au was accepted into a competitive six-year combined BS/MD program at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. During that time, he decided to specialize in pediatric urology.
“I initially chose my specialty because there is a huge reconstruction component that appealed to me. Now that I am a father of two boys, it is more personal. I love children and I want to help them,” said Au.
When asked what he loves most about his job, Au believes it’s a combination of helping empower parents in the process of getting their children healthy and seeing positive results after medical or surgical therapy.
After working in pediatric urology for years, Au developed his passion of helping children with spina bifida. Spina bifida is a birth defect that occurs when a baby’s spinal cord does not develop properly, and results in the spinal cord being exposed. This typically leads to neurogenic bladder issues and a predisposition to kidney disease.
Traditionally, urological surgery for spina bifida has been done in an open fashion, but over the last decade minimally invasive techniques have been adopted.
“There is a benefit to robotic complex urological reconstruction in patients with spina bifida. Typically, this technique helps them to recover quicker and have a shorter hospital stay,” said Au.
Spearheading the effort to provide well-rounded care for those with spina bifida, Au and other UT Physicians providers will come together to help staff a multidisciplinary spina bifida clinic.
Stay tuned for more information on the upcoming clinic and its opening.
