Just as my mentors in medical school and residency have taught me about medicine, I have learned much about healing from my father. As a child, I was always asked if I was going to become a preacher like him. My reply was always no. However, after watching him and learning more about the practice of medicine, I began to realize that I actually did want to follow in his footsteps.

Pain Medicine, like ministry, provides a significant and critical component to a holistic approach of patient care and affords patients the steps necessary to truly being able to recover. Everything that I learned from my father about empathy and caring for other people has contributed to who I am as a person and a physician today; just as everything that I learned in my medical training has shaped who I am as a Pain Management physician.

Through all of my life experiences, I have learned to see patients not just as broken bodies that need mending, but as a family in need of healing. I have had the opportunity to live and work with some of the wealthiest populations in the world, as well as some of the poorest. I have been taught to show empathy for my patients while nurturing and caring for them, independent of socioeconomic status. I will be able to employ the true compassion and humanism for people that I have learned from my father to become a better physician.