I attended Beijing Medical University for medical school China. Following medical school, I moved to the United States to complete my PhD in pathobiology at the University of Cincinnati. This program was appealing to me because I knew research was the future of medicine. I was young and idealistic and wanted to make a difference in the world.
Upon completion of my PhD, I did a two-year post doctorate fellowship at Harvard University. I completed my residency at SUNY Buffalo and then did a fellowship in hemotopathology at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas.
Initially, I chose the program at Cincinnati because I knew research was the future of medicine. Once I got into my fellowship and saw how physicians in medical practice were helping patients in real-time, I knew pathology would be the way I could make a difference. Pathology helps us to understand the pathways of disease development and, ultimately, to treat diseases effectively. I see a lot of different diseases and through pathology, my findings determine the course of treatment, especially when it comes to diseases like cancer.
When I finished my fellowships, I was working in Buffalo and looking for job opportunities. Buffalo is on the lake, so I knew I liked the water. I happened to see a listing for a pathology job opening here at Firelands. In addition, my inlaws live in Columbus, so Ohio was attractive to our family. I like that this area is a relatively small community and that Firelands is the largest healthcare provider in the area. This means that we see a lot of different pathology cases.
It is amazing to me that because of pathology, a person who was diagnosed with breast cancer decades ago can live cancer-free for twenty or thirty years. That truly improves a person’s life.
Firelands is very patient-centered. Here, patients are my primary focus. I wanted to make more of an immediate impact on patients’ lives. Modern medicine owes a lot to pathology and I’m excited by the advancements made and what good can be done for patients. It is a fulfilling job and I can’t wait to see where medicine goes in the future.
