Episode 11: Michael Brown

April 27, 2021

I was born and raised in Long Island, New York. I have an older sister who is a retired professional softball player and now instructs the game. My dad is a retired NYC firefighter, and my mother is a first- grade teacher. For some reason, since the 3rd grade, I have always wanted to be a doctor. It is hard for me to talk about the specifics of why I wanted to be a doctor when I was so young. Looking back on it, I grew up watching my parents serve the community and I know I wanted to do the same.

Admittedly, in high school, I cared a lot more about sports than I did about my grades. My life was football, wrestling, baseball, and I loved it. Halfway through my junior year, I completely dislocated my shoulder during a wrestling match. I had damage to my rotator cuff, labrum, and biceps tendon and needed surgery. I was nervous I would never play competitive sports again. Before the surgery, to put me at ease, my doctor said his previous patients went on to recover extremely well. Some even went on to play in the MLB and NFL. Coincidentally, the doctor that performed my surgery was an NYMC graduate. I easily connected with him and fully trusted him. Naturally, I told him that I wanted to go to medical school. It is his bedside manner and passion that I always try to emulate when I am with patients. We kept in touch after my surgery and years later, I had the opportunity to shadow him. After that, NYMC was always my first choice for medical school. When I applied and got in, he was one of the first phone calls I made.

For my undergraduate education, I attended the University of Florida (Go Gators) and was a biology major. Freshman year, I became a volunteer for a nursing unit at Shands Hospital. I started by stocking up supply shelves and wiping down every surface I could find with disinfectant. Over time, I built relationships with the nurses and support staff and they trusted me to assist with bedside care. I picked up every shift I could. A year later, I was hired on the same unit as a monitor support technician. I watched telemetry for 30 patients and had the privilege of going in and out of patient’s rooms assisting with their mobility. I learned how the healthcare system operates. The hospital is a foreign environment to most patients. Machines are ringing, staff buzzing in and out of rooms, and patients are being poked and prodded throughout the day/night. More often than I thought, patients did not have family members visiting them. I loved being able to talk to these individuals and learn about their lives. Something simple like adjusting their pillow or getting them glass of water meant a lot. It was my goal to make any patient’s stay as comfortable as I could. After each year in school, my foundation of science grew. I was able to apply my knowledge in the hospital and I knew at this point that medicine was the only path for me.

The motivation I have right now is my family. They are constantly supporting me. They keep me going. Some of my family members started calling me “doc” and I jokingly tell them I have a long way before that day comes. On the days where the work seems to pile up, all I do is think about the hard work I put in to get to this point and I focus right up. I’ve always had an internal drive to succeed—I'm a very competitive person, whether I play sports, video games, or something silly like a board game—I always want to win. I use that same drive to motivate me.

When I was growing up, my dad always said, “slow and steady wins the race”, like the tortoise and the hare cliché. In elementary school, whenever I took exams, I would always go through them as fast as possible and would make mistakes. I constantly had to remind myself to take my time. I think it applies to me now more than ever. I find myself constantly looking at the calendar. When is my next exam? When is my next assignment? I get ahead of myself. For the last couple years, a few days a month I record journal entries. I jot down simple things like my daily routine or my mood. It gives me an opportunity to be reflective and I feel myself slow down. I can take in my surroundings and I begin to enjoy the little things. *Deep breath* “Slow and steady” I tell myself that every day.

What are your 5 Most Recently Played Artists on Spotify?
Let me start out by saying Apple Music > Spotify. The 1975 on heavy repeat. Dave Mathews Band. Porter Robinson. Zac Brown Band. Quinn XCII.

If you could have any superpower, what would it be and why?
This one's easy. It has to be teleportation, because you’d never have buy a flight again. You just snap your fingers and *bang* you’re there. You could really go anywhere. So, say I got off work and I wanted to go on vacation; I just snap my fingers and I'm at the beach.

Pick something or someone from NYMC to give a shout out to shoutout to:
I'll give a shout out to Jessie Stephens and Max Efros, my future roommates next year.

If someone wants to talk to you, they should lead with:
Just say “Hey!” I’ll talk to anyone about anything. But if you want to get on my good side just compliment my golf swing.