Dr. Robert Michler of the Ohio State University Medical Center
has wanted to be a transplant surgeon since he was 11 years old. "I was always
fascinated by the way things work. Mechanically, the heart is a beautiful
organ." He became interested in the field when the first heart transplant
took place: Dec. 3, 1967.
Michler has performed over 400 transplant surgeries in 10 years -- he performs
about 25 transplants and between 350 and 400 heart surgeries per year. "Transplants
only account for about 10 percent of the surgeries I perform yearly," he says.
"It gives me great joy to have people fly in to have me operate on them,"
says Michler. "It's a hardship profession because your whole family will
be involved. It's hard to find time to do all the things I need to do
-- it's very challenging to try and juggle all those things and still
focus."
One area of expertise students will need is real experience in computers.
"They need to feel confident working with the Internet because they'll
need a knowledge base and rapid access to information," Michler says. "Knowledge
is the key to success. You need to know what's available on the cutting
edge.
"Stay in touch with other fields. Read Time magazine and the lay [non-technical]
press. Have your finger on the pulse of what's impacting the nation."
What thrills Michler the most about his job? "To be able to hold a heart
in your hands and know it's a life in my hands. Few people have such
a direct impact on another human being. It's awe-inspiring that this
person has left his total being to your expertise."
Confidence is a must for a transplant surgeon. "There's an element
of fear every time one operates -- it puts you on the line professionally.
What abolishes the fear is the recognition that I've worked all my life
to be where I'm at -- I'm at the top of my game and have an incredible
confidence in knowing I can handle the challenge."
Feeling the impact she's made on another person's life is what
makes surgeon Dr. Annie Fecteau enjoy the profession so much. "Pediatric surgery
in itself impacts on a patient's life -- removing a tumor or repairing
a congenital malformation. But after a liver transplant, you know you have
given your patient a second life, and that they would have died without the
transplant."
Fecteau made the decision to specialize in pediatric surgery while she
was in medical school. "I love working with children and I love surgery, so
it seemed like an obvious choice. I decided to subspecialize in liver transplants
for the challenge."
But if you're planning on pursuing a career as a transplant surgeon,
you must also realize the great commitment it requires of you. "It's
a wonderfully satisfying career, but one that takes a great commitment of
time and energy," says Dr. Kristene Gugliuzza of the University of Texas.
"Transplantation is a very open area of medicine in that there's little
known about immunology and how we can affect the immune system -- either to
suppress it, make it tolerant or to boost it."
With the challenge also comes happiness. "It's also, for the most
part, a happy time -- like having a baby," says Gugliuzza. "The patient is
off dialysis or insulin and can lead a relatively normal life."
Gugliuzza especially likes working on children. "Transplantation offers
them a chance to grow -- mentally, physically and emotionally. Plus, they
just bounce back faster and better than adults."
Time is one thing you'll need to contribute if you plan to excel in
this career. Gugliuzza's weekdays are usually 12 hours long.
"I'm on call 24 hours a day, 365 days a year for donors and to do
pancreas transplants and pediatric transplants. I'm on call about half
that time to do kidney transplants in the adult population."
If that wasn't enough, Gugliuzza is on trauma and general surgery
call about three times per month, and occasionally covers for the pediatric
surgeons and the vascular surgeons.
What's the driving force behind Gugliuzza's enthusiasm? "I helped
with the procurement of organs from a six-year-old that died from complications
in a dentist's chair. Those kidneys went to a three-year-old."