Cover Story: All in the Family

By Anne Paglia | Photos: Daymon Gardner

August 18, 2021, started the same as any other day for A. Hafeez Khan, MD. He woke up, saw patients via telepsychiatry and spent time with his grandchildren and daughter, who had stopped by for a visit.

But soon Dr. A. Hafeez Khan felt fatigued, a frequent occurrence since undergoing knee surgery. Attempting to fight the feeling, he climbed on his exercise bike and began pedaling. That’s when the chest pains started.

Upon entering Dr. A. Hafeez Khan’s room, Rubina Khan, MD, Dr. A. Hafeez Khan’s daughter, heard him complain of chest pains. He clutched his chest and slumped over, before becoming unresponsive and losing a pulse. Recognizing the signs of cardiac arrest, Dr. Rubina Khan, an Ochsner-trained physician, performed CPR on her father and resuscitated him.

“He had regained a pulse by the time EMS came to transport him to Ochsner’s main campus,” said Abdul M. Khan, MD, Dr. A. Hafeez Khan’s son. “He went from someone who was healthy and going to work to a patient in the intensive care unit, the same intensive care unit that I work in.”

When Dr. A. Hafeez Khan arrived at the hospital, the cardiology team and his son were waiting for him. The cardiology team determined he was having a severe heart attack and rushed him to the catheterization lab for an angiogram.

They inserted several stents and a left ventricular assist device before moving him to the intensive care unit.

“It was actually during the [COVID-19]Delta surge,” Dr. Abdul M. Khan said. “There were days when I worked in the hospital and would go up to the ICU at night and see my dad. It was a really scary time.”

As Dr. A. Hafeez Khan was recovering thanks to diligent care from the Ochsner team, another crisis hit the family—this time quite literally. During his stay in the hospital, Hurricane Ida tore through Louisiana, wrecking thousands of homes, including the home he shares with his wife, Shaheen Khan.

“My mom was going home and cleaning up the house while my dad was in the intensive care unit,” Dr. Abdul M. Khan said. “For a few days after the hurricane, he didn’t even know his house was destroyed.”

The Khan family remained grateful throughout this challenging time. After two weeks in the intensive care unit and a few days on the hospital floor, Dr. A. Hafeez Khan was discharged and began rehab. He and Shaheen moved into their second home while repairs started on their primary home. As of June 2022, the construction process is still underway.

“My parents have worked hard for everything they have, but they’ve also been gifted by God and had the means to rebuild,” Dr. Abdul M. Khan said. “Nearly one year later, my dad is back at work and doing the things he used to do. For someone who died—he had cardiac arrest and died—to walk out of a hospital was incredible.”

“I’m in total recovery,” Dr. A. Hafeez Khan added. “I don’t feel anything or miss anything. I’m very thankful to have recovered completely and be able to go back to my work slowly, part time. In the near future, I may want to increase my practice.”

Dr. A. Hafeez Khan has been practicing psychiatry in Louisiana for over 40 years. He moved to the U.S. in 1974, a year after completing medical school at Osmania University in Hyderabad, India. Dr. A. Hafeez Khan then pursued a master’s degree at Tulane University and fulfilled the medical licensing requirements to work in the U.S. before starting a psychiatry residency. “I’ve always wanted to be a physician since my early years,” he said. “I’ve had a passion for medicine.”

It’s a passion inherited by his four children. “My mother-in-law always addressed my children ever since they were small as doctors,” Dr. A. Hafeez Khan said. “My wife would say, ‘Please don’t brag. They’re still little.’ And my mother-in-law would say, ‘No, I have faith in all your children and they will become doctors one day.’ She lived to see all of them become doctors before she died.”

— Dr. Abdul M. Khan

All four of Dr. A. Hafeez Khan’s children trained through the Ochsner system: Dr. Abdul M. Khan in pulmonary and critical care; Dr. Rubina Khan in oncology; his eldest son, A. Majid Khan, MD, in psychiatry; and his youngest son, A. Mannan Khan, MD, in endocrinology. His son-in-law, Fawad Khan, MD, is a neurologist with Ochsner Health as well.

While Dr. A. Hafeez Khan never worked for Ochsner himself—instead leading state-run mental health clinics and his own private practice—he and his family have been going to Ochsner for primary care for decades. They are, in their words, an Ochsner family. “As somebody who has basically grown up in the Ochsner system ,I love the care that Ochsner provides and feel strongly that it’s the best care in Louisiana,” Dr. Abdul M. Khan said.

After receiving treatment for his heart, Dr. A. Hafeez Khan knew he wanted to give back to the hospital to support the same level of care for future patients. He donated $25,000 to the cardiology department. “Because of the exemplary care I received, I felt obliged to give something back to the hospital,” Dr. A. Hafeez Khan said.

As an Ochsner employee, Dr. Abdul M. Khan was also inspired to give back. He was in medical school at the University of South Alabama when Hurricane Katrina hit. Heartbroken by the wreckage, he and several other friends studying medicine vowed to return to New Orleans after graduating. “All of us quickly realized that if we don’t come back home to take care of our people, there’s a very low likelihood that others would.”

Despite the promise, Dr. Abdul M. Khan is the only one of his friends who’s still in New Orleans today. Motivated by the Healthy State by 2030 initiative spearheaded by Ochsner and the state of Louisiana, Dr. Abdul M. Khan is one of the many doctors striving to boost Louisiana’s national health ranking from 49th or 50th, where Louisiana is consistently ranked, to 40th by 2030.

“My siblings and I would love to say we helped get Louisiana out of last place in healthcare,” he said. “To me, it’s so much sweeter than if I had moved to Austin, Texas, because it’s a great place to live and practice medicine.”

He credits his parents with instilling the values of community and togetherness. “My mom, especially, made sure that we always appreciated friends and family in the area that we live in.”

For Dr. Abdul M. Khan, family means more than just blood relations. When he was working in the intensive care unit during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, he saw a number of Ochsner employees come through the doors. Every time an employee was in his care, he had the same thought: “We’re going to make sure they make it through because they’re family. It’s the same reason I work in New Orleans. I get to take care of my extended family and make sure they get good healthcare.”

The pandemic also brought financial struggles for many Ochsner employees. Dr. Abdul M. Khan heard that some colleagues were having a hard time making ends meet due unemployment and a lack of childcare. “When I heard that, I wanted to give,” he said. “Our organization is strong, but there are a lot of people who work paycheck to paycheck.”

Dr. Abdul M. Khan made a $25,000 donation to Ochsner’s Employee Assistance Program, a fund that supports staff in need of support due to natural disasters, personal needs or other unexpected financial emergencies, through the Leave Your Legacy Employee Giving campaign.

“We already live in a place where there are hurricanes and other natural disasters,” he said. “I really believe that New Orleans and Louisiana are great places to live, but if we don’t do our part to help others who may not be as fortunate as we are, then it’s hard to realistically think that we’re going to get to a place besides the bottom.”

In 2021, employees and physicians like Dr. Abdul M. Khan gave over $2.7 million through the Employee Giving campaign to provide support for our patients, their families and our fellow staff members. “You wouldn’t think twice if your brother or sister or cousin came to you and said they were really struggling and needed some assistance,” he added. “That’s the way I feel about our employees.”

That’s also the way employees feel about their patients. As Dr. A. Hafeez Khan knows well, family is there when you need a hand. “The care that I got was exemplary,” Dr. A. Hafeez Khan said. “I’m thankful to all the staff for their services and will continue to be followed by the Ochsner doctors.”