Becoming a doctor requires a major life investment. First, four years to get a bachelor's degree, another four of medical school, followed by several years of residency -- up to seven, in fact, for a specialty such as neurosurgery -- and after that, a possible fellowship. Doctors spend as many as a dozen or more years of school and training, and accrue anywhere from $75,000 to $200,000 in debt.

Dr. Kathleen Reichard '89 (left) with her mentee, Marika Fraser '04, holding a patient

Before taking on such a huge commitment, wouldn't it be good to have some idea whether you'll end up in a profession suited to your interests? Wouldn't you want to have some assurance that at the end of the line you'll have a daily schedule you can live with? And wouldn't it be good to have models you could draw on -- people who have not only jumped all the hurdles, but are practicing a branch of medicine they find both challenging and rewarding? After all, inspiration combined with a strong vision of where you're going is an invaluable and sustaining asset.

That's what pre-med student par-ticipants in the 2003 Harpur College Physician Alumni Mentoring Program are finding out.

All the students in the program are hard working, highly motivated and serious about going to medical school. All study for the Medical College Admission Test (MCAT), and many also take physics or other related courses. They credit Harpur's Pre-Health Advisory Committee and Thomas Langhorne, Harpur College pre-health adviser, for steering them through the proper channels for meeting the requirements they'll need, and for informing them of research and mentoring opportunities such as these that optimize their chances of getting into medical school.

The mentoring program also enables students to clarify or confirm their choice of profession. As Charles Aswad '53, MD, vice president and CEO of the Medical Society of the State of New York, put it, "Students have a lot of reasons for going into medicine. It might be they've had some experience with the field, an illness in the family. Not all their reasons are factually based enough to sustain someone. In this program, they get a real taste of what it's like."

The result? "The program allows us to screen out those who are going into medicine for the wrong reasons," said Dr. Thomas Brown '61, a retired anesthesiologist and a member of the Harpur Physicians Alumni Council. He was one of the first mentors in Harpur's community MD mentoring program, offered during the school year.

"For a while, people were going into medicine because they thought of it as a way to make money," said Brown, who interviews prospective medical students for SUNY Upstate Medical University. "Now, they realize that's not necessarily going to happen. We have more com-mitted applicants than in the past."

Dr. Paul Alongi '90 (left) with his mentee, Joshua Marcus '05

Selecting and providing guidance to the right candidate for the limited number of medical school slots is important, both to the profession, which has seen a dramatic drop in applications to medical school in the last three years, and to students, who nevertheless face intense competition for those slots.

"Eight years ago, there was a physician surplus," said Aswad. "Now the numbers are down again. Ten years from now, 76 million people will hit Medicare eligibility. Nursing is already facing a shortage, and a shortage is looming in primary care, especially in family practice and pediatrics. This program is absolutely the right thing at the right time."

A culture of sharing

Not surprisingly, all the doctors interviewed agree that the mentoring program is a great idea. It provides an opportunity they would have welcomed as students. And in spite of their jam-packed schedules, they are thoughtful mentors with clear ideas of what they want the students to get out of the program.

Generous with their time, attention and explanations, they assign books and articles related to what they are doing. They allow students to accompany them into examining rooms to watch and listen as they interact with their patients. Bringing students directly into operating rooms while they perform surgery, they describe, step by step, exactly what they are doing. They enable students to view their colleagues in the operating room. And they do all this because they view this kind of sharing and guidance as an integral part of their culture.

"I'm a beneficiary of good mentoring myself," said Dr. Andrew Seidman '81, an oncologist who specializes in breast cancer at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. "I want to pass on that gift."

Other doctors expressed similar motivations. "Medicine in general is an apprenticeship," said Dr. Marc Arginteanu '89, a neurosurgeon in private practice at Metropolitan Neurosurgery Associates who also holds an academic appointment at Mount Sinai Medical Center. "You can liken it to the old days of someone learning how to be a carpenter or a piano builder. Most of the learning in medicine that's not done from a book is learned at somebody's elbow in the operating room, or walking behind doctors on rounds, or standing behind them while they talk to their patients. Starting the apprenticeship earlier is worthwhile, to let someone find out if he or she can tolerate it."

Febin Melepura Õ05 (left) with his mentor, Dr. Michael Ziegelbaum Õ76

"It is very rewarding for me to be able to participate in other Binghamton students' futures," said Dr. Kathleen Reichard '89, a pediatric emergency room physician at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital. "It's very important for students to know that other people have made it and to know that alumni will do things to help BU graduates compete. Also, it's good to give back to the college."

Dr. Paul Alongi '90 of Orthopedic Spine Care of Long Island, who has been with the program for three years, agreed. "I believe in state schools," he said. "You get a great education and they're affordable."

Many doctors noted that teaching throughout the day is second nature, because they work regularly with medical students, interns and residents in teaching hospitals. So having an undergraduate shadow them in their daily rounds doesn't present a great burden.

Technical expertise and compassion

Students reap a host of benefits from observing their mentors. They get to see, firsthand, what a physician's life is like, as well as the daily rhythm and pace demanded by different specialties. They're also exposed to the tools, techniques and science involved in specific specialties.

For example, Febin Melepura '05 got to observe the high-tech medical equipment involved in performing microwave and laser therapy at work. To enable Melepura to get the best view possible, Dr. Michael Ziegelbaum '76, a urologist at Lake Success Urology Associates and an attending physician at Long Island Jewish Hospital, attached a camera to his forehead during surgery so that Melepura could watch a video screen in the operating room and see exactly what Ziegelbaum saw. Melepura, who watched as one man's large kidney stones were zapped into smaller particles with an electrode, then expelled after a saline solution was pumped into the bladder, remarked, "I didn't expect zapping the kidney stones to be that video game-ish.

Joshua Marcus '05, an economics major who is interested in an MD/MBA program, also learned about the logistics of running a practice. "That's good to know," he said. "I could imagine being shellshocked coming out of medical school to find out all you don't know about the business side of medicine."

"You have to do a lot of things before you get to the point of the most important thing: treating the patient," said Alongi. Although the students learned a great deal from the physicians, the confidence, trust and respect doctors displayed when interacting with patients was the quality that made the biggest impression.

"Dr. Seidman pays attention to a patient's entire state -- physical and emotional," said Sushma Krishna '05. "Patients here smile when Dr. Seidman walks in. They put their trust in him. He recognizes how their condition is affecting them and their family, interacts with both [the patient and her family] and knows them all very well. I've seen patients hold his hand, brighten up when he comes in. One woman was on the phone, crying, when we went into her hospital room. She was so happy and relieved just to see him. It surprised me that there are doctors like that, who don't just whiz through with each patient, even though he usually sees 15 to 20 patients a day."

Seidman noted how intense the physician/patient relationship is with patients who have a life-threatening disease. "One-third of what I do [would fall into the category of] psychiatry, treating the family," he acknowledged. People ask him, "Isn't it depressing being an oncology doctor?" But he says no. "A lot of patients recover," he said. "A lot of what we do is take care of people who are able to continue to live good lives."

Marika Fraser '04 was awed by the gravity of the responsibility physicians shoulder, and the confidence and expertise they require, when she watched Dr. Reichard do a spinal tap on an infant: "Dr. Reichard just curled the baby up into a little ball. She was so calm. I remember thinking, 'How is this possible, to insert a long needle into the spine of such a tiny baby and withdraw fluid?' The possibilities of what could go wrong were flowing through my head."

Although Reichard laughed when Fraser told this story -- "I've done that so many times, it's relatively easy," she said -- she thought the reaction was a good one. "As a doctor, you have the power to do really good things," she said. "It's a huge responsibility."

"It's overwhelmingly rewarding to see, day after day, how doctors are helping the lives of these kids," said Fraser. "I've come to realize that the doctors are not only there to help with physical ailments."

The student participants in the summer physician mentorship program had the experience of a lifetime. All said they were honored by the amount of time and attention their mentors gave them and were awed, fascinated and inspired by what they observed and learned. The one-on-one interaction with their doctor/mentors and with the other doctors, residents and medical students in that doctor's circle, the sometimes astounding diagnoses and procedures they witnessed, and the deep respect they gained for their mentors will stay in their hearts and minds for a long time.

"After this experience, I definitely want to be a doctor," said Krishna. "I'd like to be someone who does something positive for people. To be able to say, someday, 'You're cured' -- just to see that expression, that would keep me going."

Sushma Krishna '05 (right) with her mentor, Dr. Andrew Seidman '81 and a patient.

"Most of the learning in medicine that's not done from a book is learned at somebody's elbow in the operating room, or walking behind them on rounds, or standing behind them while they talk to their patients." -- Dr. Marc Arginteanu '89

Different ways of making a difference Students in the Harpur Summer Physician Mentor Program in New York City are paired with two doctors, whom they observed for a minimum of half a day for eight weeks. "The program is designed to be limber enough to allow for variety in what students get to observe," said Dr. Marc Arginteanu '89, a neurosurgeon. That was certainly the case this year for Arginteanu's mentee, Inessa Volfova '05. Vulfova was also paired with Dr. Thomas Bolte '83, an integrative internist in private practice, who calls himself a "medical detective." Inessa Vulfova '05 with her mentor, Dr. Marc Arginteanu '89 On her days with Arginteanu, Vulfova learned about reading scans and MRIs and watched Arginteanu perform such complex operations as removing a brain tumor. During a four-hour neck surgery, she recalled, Arginteanu and his surgical team were putting screws into the patient's neck. "And in the middle of it, they came to find that the neck wasn't able to hold the screws directly, so they had to open up the whole spine. I saw the whole spinal cord!" "I've seen operating rooms in movies before, but now it was so real!" Vulfova said. "What surprised me the most was how calm all of them seemed. I saw Dr. Arginteanu smiling, joking, yet he remained so focused. Even then he took time to explain what he was about to do." Days with Dr. Bolte had an entirely different tenor. "He spends at least 1 to 1 1/2 hours with each patient," Vulfova said. "They talk about books, medicine, nutrition, philosophy of life, literature, how our surroundings affect us, and the patient's own life." At first, Vulfova acknowledged, she wondered at the significance of these discussions. But it's in just such far-reaching exchanges that Bolte sometimes finds the root cause of a patient's complaint. For example, one patient had a rash over her entire body. He noted that she had elevated levels of petrochemicals in her blood, and set out to ascertain why. As it turned out, her trailer was located over a train depot from the 1800s. After the contaminated earth beneath her trailer was removed and replaced, the patient's rash went away. "After seeing Dr. Arginteanu and Dr. Bolte with their patients, I feel that doctors really do make a difference," said Vulfova. "I am overwhelmed with happiness; I found my passion. It is the field of medicine." The alumni physicians who participated in the 2003 Harpur Summer Physician Mentor Program included: Paul Alongi '90, an orthopedic surgeon; Marc Arginteanu '89, a neurosurgeon; Robert Best '88, an emergency room pediatrician; Thomas Bolte '83, an integrative internist; Steven Cohen '79, an ultrasound specialist; Robert Fuentes '70, an internist and diabetes specialist; Naomi Jackman '90, a pediatrician; Elise Jonisch '77, a pediatrician; Douglas Katz '86, a diagnostic radiologist; Hal Kazdin '73, an internist; Keith LaScalea '94, an internist; Gerald Rakos '76, a pediatrician and neonatal and perinatal physician; Kathleen Reichard '89, pediatric emergency room physician; Linda Rogers '88, internist and pulmonary and critical care physician; Victor Scarmato '88, a radiologist; Michael Schwartz '88, an orthopedic surgeon; Andrew Seidman '81, an oncologist who specializes in breast cancer; Neil Sperling '81, an otolarygologist; Toba Weinstein '82, a pediatric gastroenterologist; Steven Weiss '84, an allergy, asthma and immunology physician; Mary Winik '83, an anesthesiologist; and Michael Ziegelbaum '76, a urologist. In addition, Martin Edelstein, general practitioner, parent of a current student and member of the Harpur MD Advisory Council, participated in the program. If you are a physician and you are interested in participating in the Harpur Summer Physician Alumni Mentoring Program, please contact Lee Nesslage via e-mail at nesslage@binghamton.edu or call 607.777.4278.