Bailey Brooks, MD
Broadlawns Medical Center
Where you work: 
I have worked in the Outpatient Behavioral Health Clinic at Broadlawns Medical Center in Des Moines since I graduated residency in 2024.
Typical day in your shoes:
For me, each day is a little different. I staff our general psychiatry resident clinic on Monday mornings and see my own patients in clinic in the afternoon. On Tuesdays, I am embedded within our OBGYN clinic in the main hospital, seeing primarily pregnant and postpartum women and on occasion women with mental health symptoms related to menstruation and/or perimenopause. On Thursdays, I staff our perinatal resident clinic in the mornings and see my own patients in the afternoon. Fridays, I see follow up patients virtually working from home. When I am not at work, I am catching up on the physician workload that doesn’t seem to fit into clinical work hours, keeping up (trying to keep up) with the load of adulthood and motherhood and most importantly, making and finding joy in as many moments as possible with my family.
What advice would you give yourself if you could go back to year 1 in your profession?:
It’s okay to recognize if what you envisioned attending life to look like is a bit different (and harder) than you anticipated. It takes time to adjust to the new role transition (and often times, change in city/medical system/EMR), and things do get easier with time. Give yourself grace in learning more about yourself as a provider and acknowledging the surprises (enjoying things you didn’t think you would, not enjoying things you were confident you would), the challenges, and the biggest joys. Lastly, be willing to be flexible and advocate for yourself in order to find a good work-life balance.
What is your go to midnight snack?
I am a working mom of young children and go to bed far before midnight😜, but if I’m having a snack, it’s probably something with peanut butter.
What recipe do you make that could be a top seller on a restaurant menu?
This is not a skill that I have… but my daughter does ask me to make mac n cheese, tuna and peas, and I can make a mean peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
If you had to change jobs tomorrow, what is another job you think you’d be great at?
Being a full-time mom or owner of a community space for mothers to connect and have support.
