LITTLE ROCK, Ark — Dr. Konstantinos “Kostas” Arnaoutakis is a globally recognized, published, and highly regarded medical provider at the UAMS Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute in Little Rock, Arkansas. He specializes in lung and blood cancers, and is board certified in three categories.
Dr. Arnaoutakis is also an educator, teaching the next generation of doctors in Arkansas important information about cancer and cancer treatment.
“I believe that medicine is a wonderful field. Personally, I feel like it’s very important. It has been very important for my growth as a person,” Dr. Arnaoutakis said.
He came to the U.S. after receiving his medical degree from the University of Patras in his native country of Greece.
Following his residency at Albany Medical College-Albany Medical Center Hospital, he served a Fellowship in Hematology and Oncology at Tufts University, St. Elizabeth’s Medical Center in Boston. He would later become Chief Hematology and Medical Oncology Fellow at Tufts, before joining the staff at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences.
Dr. Arnaoutakis emphasized that he enjoys practicing medicine while also teaching future providers.
This can seen as he’s an associate professor at UAMS. He said he is encouraged by the quality of students he sees but concerned with the dropping numbers in enrollments at medical schools in America.
“I think medicine attracts good people. Taking care of patients also makes you a better person," he said. "I try to emphasize this to college students considering medicine. Yes, there are issues, and yes, there are problems, but it’s still a wonderful field. And if I had to do it again, I would probably do it again”.
According to the Association of American Medical Colleges, medicine is a field suffering from smaller pools of applicants.
Dr. Arnaoutakis said he understands that younger people may view the field as fraught with bureaucracy, heavy student loan debt, and a lack of quality time with patients. He said that this is especially worrisome for a rural state like Arkansas.
“Especially primary care, in Arkansas, we have a shortage of primary care physicians. It’s a rural state, so we need a lot of good, primary care physicians in rural areas”, Dr. Arnaoutakis said.
He explained he’s also aware of the emotional toll of the industry. Doctors or other healthcare providers can experience burnout, even choosing to leave the field. Dr. Arnaoutakis carries that awareness into the classroom to show students how critical it is to practice self-care.
“We teach fellows how to overcome it. How to develop resilience. That’s really important. And how to advocate for their colleagues. Because if you sense that one of your colleagues is not doing well, I think it’s your obligation to help them,” he said.
More than anything, Dr. Arnaoutakis said he hopes to encourage Arkansans to make and keep a relationship with a primary care provider. According to Dr. Arnaoutakis, it's the trust that’s built that can help to ease any fears of keeping up with your health through screenings or reporting unusual symptoms.
“In the old days, they used to say knowledge is power. And knowledge can come with some fear. But it’s better, especially in cancer, to know what you’re dealing with because the treatments are easier and more successful when you develop early-stage cancer than when it’s detected at a later stage,” Dr. Arnaoutakis said.