You may have been wondering what to do after medical school–or perhaps you haven’t had the time to even think about it. In any case, the possibilities are endless. Let these five physicians’ tales inspire you to explore your unique career opportunities. Your future awaits you.
The New Physician, September 2001
So there he was. The Jerk, in person.
Alice Brandfonbrener had no idea when she decided to go to medical school that she would one day wind up here, rustled from her office at Northwestern University in the comfy northern suburbs and called down to Chicago’s Van Buren “L” station, to treat a case of ordinary bronchitis. Of course, this case didn’t belong to just any ordinary throat. It was Steve Martin’s, and he was filming “Planes, Trains and Automobiles,” and if she didn’t get down there right away, well … ladies and gentlemen, I bid you to consider the cinematic disaster that might have unfolded. Did you laugh at “Planes, Trains … ”? Yes? Go tell Alice: “Thank you.”
The truth is, though, that the comedian’s cough was far less interesting than what comprises the rest of Brandfonbrener’s world as a physician in performing arts medicine. No, the Columbia University medical school graduate and Northwestern University professor doesn’t serenade her patients in the examination room; in fact, she’s not very musical at all. But what she does do is ensure that actors, musicians, vocalists, dancers and the like can perform their jobs without injury.
To the untrained, it might seem like a medical catering service for prima donnas with hangnails on their pinkies. But Brandfonbrener’s expertise–which she began to develop when she became the first staff doctor for the Aspen Music Festival in 1983–is widely sought after and highly technical. She learned, she says, “to combine traditional medicine techniques with knowledge of the instruments [the musicians] were playing, the way they were being taught, the way they were trained.”
And voila–a specialization was born. One that, despite managed care’s song and dance, is thriving among performers because it’s the only medicine that understands the real demands of their professions.
“We can speak their lingo,” says Brandfonbrener, who founded the Performing Arts Medicine Association. “We can ask about the medical symptoms they have, the aches and pains, in artistic terms. We can talk to them about what they can do–and avoid doing–in terms of their talents.”
Piano players, for instance, suffer from too much finger motion. They frequently don’t know how to use the full weight of their arms on the keys, and particularly in a classical musician who practices for hours, the physical effects can be devastating.
“We’ll see a lot of students right before exams or juries, because those are the times when they’re practicing the most and at the same time dealing with a lot of the emotional tension that goes along with it,” she says.
Many of the injuries she treats come as a result of poor teaching methods or just plain inhumane training hours. She spends a great deal of time educating performers and their instructors about healthy practicing.
And the field, she says, is growing, despite those within the industry who still believe her patients are “just neurotic musicians who were making it all up. This is life to these performers; their talents are what drive them.”
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