Lifes Lessons
[Applause]
how did i become the recipient of the
american college of servitude’s lifetime
achievement award
thank goodness it is not given for
scientific achievement or innovation
because i have never made an
earth-shattering discovery
it is given for surge of service to the
college i have indeed given over 50
years of service to the college
but i am told that i was singled out
because i encouraged so many
others to become involved and brought
new ideas and programs to the college
i do not view myself as anybody special
i am a girl from a poor family in rural
new york
who was educated primarily in public
schools
or through the generosity of others i
chose to become a surgeon and remained
at my alma mater
suny upstate medical university my whole
career
i have always known how to be useful i
can in hindsight
see strategies and events that cause me
to follow this path of service
although i did face bias and adversity i
did not let it deter me
the resilience to overcome challenges
and the willingness
to work to eliminate them i believe is
the reason i have been honored on many
occasions
perhaps a little of the story of my life
and the lessons i have learned
throughout can help others although one
cannot change one’s childhood
many of the lessons i learned as a child
can be taught to children
to inspire them to become independent
creative
and to develop a good work ethic
as a young child we moved to rural new
york where both of my parents worked my
siblings were older than
i and my best friend became my father’s
aunt
who lived with us auntie had endless
curiosity
she read voraciously and taught me to do
the same
she valued excellence each morning we
did spelling words
i still get really upset when i get a
red underline
indicating i have spelled something
incorrectly
i learned you could be perfect if you
worked at it she admired eleanor
roosevelt and taught me to do
the same eleanor’s aphorism still guide
me
do what is right because someone will
criticize you anyway
every day do something that frightens
you just a little
no one can take away your
self-confidence without your consent
and so many more of her wise sayings
emulating why successful people
can lead you to push yourself have
heroes
give children inspiration
i had a great deal of alone time i was
responsible for myself
there were rules such as you have to
call if you are going to be late
for supper and when you hear a car
coming down the road you need to get off
your bicycle and stand by the side of
the road
pretty practical advice as only one lane
of our road was paved
i knew the rules but beyond that i was
on my own
i organized my own activities picked out
my own clothes
and earned money as soon as i could
being allowed to make decisions and
having to live with them
made me thoughtful and resilient as some
choices did not work out so well how
many times did i hear
and now what are you going to do usually
after something had not gone well
the admonition that went with it was you
could have done better
having this independence as a child was
important in making me able to handle
bigger challenges
as i aged when i was about 10 my father
had a stroke
and my sister developed multiple
sclerosis living with them
gave me an understanding and acceptance
of those with disabilities i was never
shielded from the less pleasant things
in life
which added to my resilience the
experience
with their physicians made me want to
become a doctor
a choice supported by my family and
teachers
remembering the impact of my family’s
doctors i try and engage children
when they accompany their family or if
they are the patients
i have now lived long enough to see some
of them actually come through medical
school
i observed that whenever our family
faced a challenge the approach was to
figure out
the way forward not to bemoan our tough
circumstances
the ability to problem-solve stuck with
me forever
and i was to face challenges as a child
i never felt gender bias
but that came to an end when i entered
college
the college had become co-ed only three
years earlier
and had far more men than women i was
pre-med
at orientation the pre-med group was
told
that the women should consider an
alternative career
as few women got into medical school
with the help of the only woman on the
science faculty of our college i was
accepted into medical school
after only three years of college that
solidified my already held belief
that no was only a suggestion i still
believe
no is the most empowering word in the
english language
i learned also that academic excellence
could overcome many an obstacle the
first years of medical school were not
my favorite
but were a necessary evil to get to the
prize clinical medicine
a worthwhile lesson you sometimes need
to do
things that are really tough or
unpleasant to get to what you want
and i used to tell my patients when they
were facing challenges
hang tough this too shall pass this too
shall pass was always a family mantra
and still is
during my third year of medical school
my mother became terminally ill
her surgeons they were smart they were
kind and they actually figured out what
was wrong with her
they were very useful which resonated
with me
once again my hero worship guided me
on my decision and i wanted to become a
surgeon
i did not appreciate that none of the
surgeons were women
and when i applied for a surgical
residency my
applications were just returned can you
imagine that
one program actually did give me an
interview and when i arrived
they said oh we don’t take women
surgeons i could not resist saying i’ve
never known a woman
a man named patricia joy i did resist
saying some other things which was a
very wise choice
i was able to negotiate a residency
position with the chair of surgery
who had been my mother’s doctor
following residency
i did not have job offers and by then
my father had also died thank goodness
my parents
had inspired independence as at 26 i was
without them
i created a tapestry of small jobs until
the new chair of surgery asked me to
join the department
i had never contemplated an academic job
but like
teaching and the university environment
so i accepted
then figured out how to be an academic
surgeon
research was not my first love teaching
was
i was told by many that closing my
research lab
would end my academic career i closed my
lab anyway
i focused on becoming an academic
educator by learning psychometrics to
improve
exams if you really want to be
considered an expert you should be one
you can only fake it for just so long
surgical education
has now become a respected academic
activity
the american college of surgeons gave me
great opportunities
to work on a number of education
projects
just as this offer of an academic
position
many of my best experiences have come
serendipitously
so always look at an offer it may turn
out to be great
the two most improbable offers i
received were to become associate dean
and run the educational aspects of the
dean’s office
when i was only nine years out of my
residency
another was to run for the ama council
on scientific affairs
each ended up being a really terrific
experience and allowed me to do many
things i felt needed doing such things
as improving the early experience in
medical school while associate team
and while on the council of scientific
affairs assuring processes were in place
to see that mammography was of good
quality
i learned how to administer programs and
much about human nature
both fitted into my desire to provide
service
as an administrator i learned to listen
so i could understand and hopefully find
a face-saving
resolution to some seemingly impossible
problems such as a revered professor is
no longer a safe surgeon
now what the most difficult part was to
listen to people
who had a very different view of things
than and a different value system than i
this is still
challenging but you can do it and if you
really listen you can learn
things both of you can work toward a
solution
and you can really have a much better
understanding
of their problem and why they believe
what they believe
you also often realize that there is an
issue that has caused the problem that
they’re dealing with
and that that needs to be addressed your
solution was always better with diverse
input
often during difficult conversations i
would use self-talk
i’ve always found self-talk very helpful
telling yourself that you can be patient
that you will not lose your temper that
you will be happy
that you are not tired that you can
really get that tumor out
and so many more things if you cannot
believe yourself
then who i also learned that it takes no
more work to be happy
than miserable attitude matters
i really realized early that since there
were no women
in surgery or for that matter in
medicine
i needed the support of enlightened men
to this day
it is critical to getting to
to getting support to get things
accomplished you can even
change biased men to accept that women
are capable
learning to change things slowly but
steadily helps
as the saying goes you can even eat an
elephant if you do so one bite at a time
engaging others in your projects is
helpful to their careers as well
you gain support for the things you wish
to do by being trustworthy
conversations are confidential gossip is
detrimental
a good friend who happened to be a
psychiatrist would say
it is their tale to tell betrayal of
someone’s confidence is always
discovered
and remembered the growing awareness of
the lack of women in medicine
and the many disparities they faced
became increasingly upsetting why should
women be the ones who always get the
thankless jobs and get paid less
i then attended the first women in
academia leadership conference
and realized that it was not just women
surgeons but that discrimination toward
women was pervasive
at the end of the conference each of us
promised to do something locally
and nationally to eradicate this bias
problem i did not know any women
surgeons
so i put up an invitation for women
surgeons attending the american college
of surgeons
meeting in 1981 to join me for breakfast
about 20 came i found like-minded women
with problems similar to my own the
association of women surgeons which
resulted is now 40 years old
and has members throughout the world
thus began
my quest for equity and inclusion of
women in surgery
i felt it important for women to align
themselves with mainstream organizations
which helped the american college of
surgeons be more inclusive of women
we held our meeting just before theirs
and had a great program which attracted
women
and they would then stay for the college
meeting and therefore became involved in
the college
becoming involved in education in
low-income countries made me even more
aware of the need for recruitment of
women to surgery
without women surgeons there would never
be
an adequate workforce i have been able
to help women in many countries improve
their circumstances
the american college of surgeons gave me
a great latitude in promoting women’s
issues and recruiting women to surgery
after all once you break the glass
ceiling you should not pull up the
ladder and patch it over
you need to widen the opening and build
permanent stairs
during my work with women i realized the
value of the american college of
surgeons to surgeons throughout the
world
and actively engaged and recruited them
the international members are now the
largest growing segment of the college
i tried to be sure that my advocacy was
always done respectively and inclusively
i learned and taught others how to
change the role and image of women
between the association of women
surgeons and working with the
association for surgical education
i realized that one or a few people can
make a difference
and that if you see something that needs
to be done just do it
do not wait to be asked you will find
support if it is a good
idea always be useful was another mantra
in my family
i think that willingness to look at a
problem and address it without
being asked is why i have been given
amazing recognition
such as the american college of surgeons
lifetime achievement award
always remember to accept recognition
with humility and give thanks
to the many others who have helped in
these efforts
perhaps the most valuable lesson i
learned was to help others attain their
dreams
whether it be by teaching and mentoring
students in residence
inviting someone to join a group or
introducing
people to one another you gain more than
you give
a simple thing like remembering when you
introduce people to mention a bit about
them
may create a connection these
connections have a tremendous
beneficial effect on many people’s
careers
you should always take advantage of the
opportunity to nominate and to recommend
others reveling in the success of others
will bring great rewards and have those
people want to support you
always want those around you to be as
good and confident as you
when you treat people that way they rise
to the task
when given this award they mentioned how
many people my service work has impacted
what better a legacy could anyone want
now nearly 80 i still have much to learn
how does one remain relevant functional
and useful thank you for listening