Brain Tumor Talk
A podcast brought to you by the Ivy Brain Tumor Center that engages leading experts, courageous survivors, and compassionate caregivers for meaningful conversations on the latest research developments, treatment options, and the power of resilience when faced with a brain tumor.
Brain Tumor Talk
A Neurosurgical Legend: Dr. Robert F. Spetzler
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In this captivating episode of Brain Tumor Talk, we sit down with the legendary Dr. Robert F. Spetzler, whose groundbreaking career has left an indelible mark on the world of medicine. From developing life-saving techniques like cardiac standstill and the Spetzler-Martin grading system to a childhood experience with tetanus that shaped his empathy as a physician, Dr. Spetzler shares the defining moments of his journey.
We delve into the critical role of teamwork in achieving medical breakthroughs and the power of subspecialization in improving patient outcomes. Dr. Spetzler reflects on the emotional resilience required in neurosurgery, offering heartfelt anecdotes about the challenges and triumphs faced by surgeons.
Join us as we celebrate Dr. Spetzler's extraordinary legacy and explore the bright future of neurosurgery through his unique insights, inspiring stories, and unwavering commitment to improving lives.
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Welcome to Brain Tumor Talk , a podcast brought to you by the Ivy Brain Tumor Center at Barrow Neurological Institute . This show unites leading experts , inspiring survivors and compassionate caregivers in conversations about the latest in research and treatment . Together , we share stories filled with challenges and hope . I am your host , michelle Palacino , a member of the Ivy Center team . My deep understanding of brain cancer comes from both my professional insights and personal experience as the daughter of a brain cancer patient . Brain Tumor Talk is your invitation to connect , learn and find support in this community . The information shared on this podcast is for educational and informational purposes only . Nothing stated on this podcast should be considered medical advice . Welcome to Brain Tumor Talk . I'm your host , michelle Palacino .
Speaker 1Today's guest is nothing short of a legend in the world of neurosurgery . Dr Robert F Spetzler , renowned for his pioneering work in vascular neurosurgery , has tackled some of the most complex and high-risk brain surgeries ever performed . With over 6,000 aneurysm clippings to his name and the development of groundbreaking techniques like the cardiac standstill and the Spetzer-Martin grading system , he has redefined what's possible in brain surgery . He is the only two-time recipient of the most prestigious recognition in neurosurgery the honored guest of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons . As the former president and CEO of the Barrow Neurological Institute . He's mentored countless neurosurgeons , leaving a lasting legacy in the field . We're honored to have him on today to share his stories from his incredible career and insights into the future of neurosurgery . Dr Spetzer , thank you so much for joining us today .
Speaker 2Thank you , Michelle , for that overly kind introduction .
Speaker 1I don't think we could overstate how much you've really impacted this field . It is really incredible . I know we were talking about this . I've done a lot of research in the past few months really just to even dive in and get a spoonful of what you've .
Speaker 2I appreciate that , but in many ways I'm sort of the recipient of the intelligence commitment of people around me . If I have one particularly good talent , it's to delegate , and when I delegate I get a lot of the benefit of whatever my delegates have success in .
Speaker 1Yeah , I have to ask you how did you get started in the field of neurosurgery
What inspired Dr. Spetzler to pursue a career in medicine
Speaker 1?
Speaker 2You know , I was very , very early in my decision to become a neurosurgeon , when I was a freshman in high school . In my yearbook , where it asks for what do you want to be , I already put in neurosurgery . I think it had to do with an event when I was six years old . I stepped on a rusty nail and that developed into tetanus . And when you have tetanus and this was back in post-war Germany it's a debilitating disease where you have big spasms like seizures .
Speaker 2And I was diagnosed fairly late and so in the middle of the night I was actually my parents put me in the end room to their bedroom chamber because I wasn't doing well .
Speaker 2I was one of six kids and I broke an old family vase in one of these attacks and then I expected some form of punishment when my mother came in and instead she hugged me and in the middle of the night they drove me to the University Hospital . They my dad kept telling me stories because as soon as I drifted off I would go into these tetany attacks . And I was brought to the university hospital in the middle of the night and I remember these white coats standing around and then they burned out . They cauterized the little sore that I had in my toe and because I was so far along , they didn't want to put me in the pediatric ward because they know I wouldn't survive , so they put me in a storage chambers of the big iron lung machines . This was back in the days when iron lung machines kept people alive from polio when their respiratory systems were paralyzed . So they had these incredibly huge machines .
Speaker 2Me little six-year-old with these huge machines in the storage room oval window , my mother crying outside and saying if he's going to die , let me take him home . But they gave me what was then a relatively new drug called penicillin . It killed the bug and then I spent I don't know , maybe two months in the hospital . And one last important event was the physician that took care of me . The professor was obviously very proud of that . He had a case of certain fatalities survived because of penicillin . So they presented me as a case in front for four rounds . So , in my six-year-old eyes , I was placed on a little table on the stage and I looked out at the sea of white coats out at the sea of white coats . And then the professor took my robe off . I was standing there completely naked , six years old , so that he could demonstrate the free flexes .
Speaker 2To this day . I still feel the embarrassment I feel then , and I hope that in some way it gave me maybe a little more empathy for my patients , because we're always rushed , we don't have enough time , et cetera .
Speaker 1Yeah , you know , everyone always says that . Or a lot of people who get into this field always say that they're brought into the field , or they had an incredible mentor and they see these physicians as sort of godlike , really indestructible , and that's kind of how they got swept into the field . Or they had an incredible mentor and they see these physicians as sort of godlike , really indestructible and that's kind of how they got swept into the field . Would you say that this physician was the reason that you decided to get into the field , or was it just the whole experience ?
Speaker 2No , I think I don't really know why I chose neurosurgery , but I'm sure because none of my family had been in medicine . They've been engineers , they've been educators , they've been scientists , but not into medicine . No , his having me on that little table . I had no personal relationship to him at the age of six , so he was not a hero to me . He was a cause of my incredible memory of embarrassment .
Speaker 2But then when I went , since I knew I wanted to be a neurosurgeon in high school , I did research in college and then I did research in medical school and I went to medical school where there was a professor named Dr Busey who was the most eminent neurosurgeon in the country at the time and he took me under his wing and that's sort of how things progressed .
Speaker 1Yeah , I've heard that the phrase like you've opened up no man's land . And you came to Barrow and really it did not have the reputation that it does today . You really made it a world-renowned institution , and so I have to ask what brought you to Barrow Neurological Institute
What brought him to Barrow Neurological Institute and how it grew into a world-renowned destination for neurology and neurosurgery
Speaker 1?
Speaker 2Yeah . So I was interviewing for a chairmanship position in New York . I was offered the position and I was in negotiation with the dean of the university , but it didn't feel right . They never asked my wife to come and see the place . And then Dr Green , who was my predecessor here , had formed a search committee to find his replacement and it had the prerequisites for me of something to look at and that is it had a residency program and that was very important because I wanted to be involved in teaching resin . I was at Case Western at the time . So when he met me at a meeting and said , you know , please come and look , he insisted that on the very first trip my wife Nancy come out with me . Well , when she heard that I was going to interview in Phoenix , she said well , if you go to Phoenix you're going without me , because she remembered driving through Phoenix in the middle of July in an un-air-conditioned car . But when John insisted we come out together and it was in the fall , it couldn't have been nicer .
Speaker 1Yeah .
Speaker 2And we've loved Phoenix ever since . Yeah . And it was the challenge . This was a very small program , but I like challenges , so it was perfect for me .
Speaker 1Yeah , I think that a lot of people are familiar with your name , and then also in partnership with you is Dr Volker Sontag , who is a legend in his own right and he's obviously been a significant part of your journey and a significant part of the Barrow journey . You guys come from a similar upbringing , parallel career paths . How did your partnership with Dr Sontag influence your approach to neurosurgery and how is kind of your collaboration together ?
Speaker 2Yeah well , michelle , when I came I was introduced to Dr Sontag by Dr Green . Volker Sontag was in private practice in Phoenix . There was an immediate bond between not just Volker and myself but also between our wives , so we became friends and so I asked him to join the group that I was establishing for the BNI , and that group's goal was subspecialization . That meant within neurosurgery , you had to pick an area that you were going to be improving , you're going to be at the cutting edge , you're going to push the envelope . And he ended up doing spine and he became the most recognized spine surgeon internationally and he bought into the vision that we then shared with resident education and research etc . And he was an absolutely invaluable partner in achieving the prominence of the B&I that holds today . But it wasn't just Volker , it was a whole team of individuals . Joseph Bramski was in my lab at Case Western . He came with me to Phoenix when I came . But there were a whole number of individuals that all came together and bought into the vision of making the BNI really what it became .
Why he passionately advocates for subspecialization within neurosurgery
Speaker 1You just mentioned the subspecialization . You are a huge part of the residency training program here and I know that there is a huge focus on subspecialization . Can you talk about why you think it's so important for neurosurgeons to really have this ?
Speaker 2It's very simple never acquire the number of cases in one category that allow you to call yourself an expert . Subspecialization gives you the experience of seeing a problem over and over again , enough so you can begin to look for options of improving the care of that particular problem . And that's what subspecialization is all about . So we pushed subspecialization very hard . We also pushed to get the very best residents , because and a program is only as good as its residents , and so we worked very hard to get the very best residents and we ended up having our pick of the many , many , many hundreds of applicants that applied for the four positions a year . They've been absolutely spectacular .
Speaker 1Well , I have to say , while we're talking about residents and mentorship , your former fellows and residents have described you as the consummate teacher , and you've been instrumental in the resident training program . What is the most important lesson that you hope that your trainees , or even our residents , are carrying with them ?
The one ingredient Dr. Spetzler thinks is essential for being a good neurosurgeon
Speaker 2Yeah , I should say that I've had the opportunity to train over 200 residents and fellows , but I've also had countless international visitors that have spent an international fellowship here a year , two years , three months , six months , etc . And they are my professional children . I'm incredibly proud of them . What I wanted from them is the one ingredient that I think is essential to be a good neurosurgeon , and that is passion . Passion for this specialty . You have to give it everything you've got . You owe that to your patients , and so these individuals that commit themselves to this specialty don't just have the passion , but it comes along with empathy , comes along with understanding the incredible trauma that patients and their families face when they suddenly find out that they have ruptured , aneurysm or a tumor or whatever else they're facing .
Speaker 1This leads me to my next question , which is kind of about broadening your horizon . Your brother shared a story about how you used to quiz residents on music and culture and current events during your rounds and he mentions that this was about emphasizing the importance of broadening kind of a surgeon's horizons and alluding to the fact that you can't really empathize with patients unless your horizon is widened . Where did this philosophy come from ? Was it from that original penicillin experience ?
Speaker 2No , it didn't have to do with that . I grew up in a household where my father had broad interests . He played chess with me . We listened to classical music together , I learned how to play the piano , and so there was much more to life than just his profession . And so I grew up in a household where we had discussions every evening at dinner , and I wanted our residents to be broad . They , as a physician , they were going to be broad . As a physician , they were going to be important members of their society , and they shouldn't just be narrowed into being a physician but also be broad-minded , whether it's politics , religion , arts , whatever you pick up , so that they have something outside of medicine , right ?
Speaker 1You have operated , you've done over thousands . You've something outside of medicine , right , you have operated . You've done over thousands . You've done thousands of cases . How have you maintained that empathy and a connection to each and every one of these cases ?
Speaker 2That was not hard . Each patient , when you see them , presents a new challenge how are you going to help them ? And when you have a positive impact on a patient , it is an incredibly gratifying experience . More devastating is when you fail , whether it's something like a malignant brain tumor that you can't cure . You can just help , maintain and you try for extended quality of life , but you know that the patient is going to succumb to the disease and so on down the line , and so the failure is really what stick with you . Every neurosurgeon has their sort of like a graveyard where the bad cases reside . So whenever you have a success , it's always balanced by the fact that you remember the last case that you weren't able to help this .
Speaker 1um , I was just thinking about so you've've done really , really complex some of the most high-risk vascular surgeries , but I think what a lot of people don't know is that you're also an extremely prolific brain tumor surgeon as well , and you've taken on cases that many have deemed inoperable or impossible . What made you gravitate towards those cases or impossible ? What made you gravitate towards those cases ?
Speaker 2Michelle , that's a very good question , and the answer is straightforward . As a vascular neurosurgeon , you deal with blood vessels all the time . The biggest risk with tumor surgery are blood vessels . So the vascular surgeon who becomes a tumor surgeon or does both right from the beginning has a distinct advantage , because you can do things like take a blood vessel from the outside of the head and anastomose it to a blood vessel in the inside of the head because the tumor has eroded the primary blood vessel , and so those sort of skills are not usually inherent in somebody that is just doing tumor surgery in the beginning . So the advantage for a skull-based tumor surgeon to also be a vascular surgeon is immense .
Speaker 1So , while we're on this subject , and alluding to your last answer , you mentioned the graveyard of cases . Can you talk about a particularly challenging case that you remember that ?
Speaker 2sticks with you , the there's an entity called an AVM , which is a tangle of blood vessels which they're very fragile and they can explode , and one particular case very early on in my career was a very , very tough one . One particular case very early on in my career was a very , very tough one . I had already received quite a bit of reputation for tackling these particular entities AVMs that I worked hours and hours on getting this out successfully , very pleased afterwards . And then I get a call at two o'clock at night and these are always dreadful calls happen way too frequently that the patient had suddenly become comatose . He was fine after surgery , comatose , and so in this bed where you had taken out this tangle of blood vessels , there are a lot of raw coagulated vessels that had been controlled and one of them ruptured , caused a huge hematoma blood clot that ended up just devastating this young man .
Speaker 1How do you maintain any kind of optimism or not get hung up on questioning the ? Where did this go wrong with all of them ?
Speaker 2Well , I think when you operate , there will always be complications , it just they don't happen very frequently , but when they do , they can be as devastating as that one , or they can be minor , and so we have something called Morbidity and Mortality Conference where we present all complications . What is the most important aspect of a complication is that we dissect it . We don't point fingers , but we look at how can this be avoided . How can we take this tough lesson and benefit the next patient that has a similar problem ?
Speaker 1So we're looking at the complications and the negatives , but to shine a brighter light . You know , looking back at your career , you've had many , many accomplishments and you've advanced the field . And looking back , what's the highlight ? I mean , I was actually reading this story about a boy , enrico , who was a 4-year-old boy . That surgery was miraculous . But over the span of your career , what would you say would be the highlight ?
Speaker 2I don't think you can point it to one individual patient . I think the fact that we developed access routes to portions of the brain that had never before been considered sort of a no man's land . If you go there , you're gonna hurt the patient irreversibly . There's a structure called the brain stem where all the function of the brain pass through a bundle in the brain stem that's no bigger than your thumb , and so when there's a problem in that thumb , it was considered impossible to treat this , and with new diagnostics , with new imaging modalities , et cetera , we were able to define those areas and then we found routes to get there . Wasn't just us but many of our colleagues around the world that worked on this , and so we opened up pathways and were able to help people that beforehand we would just have had said I'm sorry , there's nothing that we can do and trainees that the , this visionary attitude , this grit , determination is something that you can teach , or is it something that you have to identify and the people that are coming through and select them carefully ?
Speaker 2michelle , very well done . Yes , um ,
What he thinks it takes to be successful in this field
Speaker 2I think , for somebody to want to enter this field , which is a field that requires a willingness to always say yes when you're called , when somebody's in trouble , that creates a big burden on your family , and so they have to buy into this . They already have that grit that you're talking about . What I think is most important is that not only do they have the passion and dedication , but they also are enough of a mensch , enough of a human being to show the empathy to their patients and families that is required .
Speaker 2It's very tough because surgery takes up so much of your time . Then you have research , then you have teaching , and then you see your patients . All of that has to be squeezed in and so you never really have the amount of time for your patients that you would like to have to sit down and get to know them better , et cetera . It's always rushed . To sit down and get to know them better , et cetera . It's always rushed . So it's important during that rush to let them know that my job is really when you're in the operating room . That's when I take all the time that is required . I'm sorry I only have so little time , but I understand your problem and this is what I recommend .
Speaker 1Right , you know , you just kind of touched on it . That's what I recommend , Right , you know you just kind of touched on it . The balance between family and this career . It's a precarious balance and I have a quote of you saying that the secret to success is having passion in what you do . And if you're happy at home , you're happy at work . And a lot of our residents are starting families and they are trying to find this balance . How did you balance the demands of this job with happiness in your personal life ?
Balancing neurosurgery demands with happiness in personal life
Speaker 2Well , I met my wife in the hospital . She was a nurse student and she was taking care of a patient with a brainstem glioma , so that we talked about the brainstem before this young man was dying . There was absolutely no hope for him . That's the only patient she took care of and she needed an order for more fluids , more hydration . So she paged the person that had written the last order , which happened to be me . I was a medical student , so she paged me out of rounds and I came to the thing and I stood before and she gave me every fact . She just kept talking , just just one thing after the other . Finally , she ran out of every electrolyte value that she could possibly come up with and she said well , what do you think ? And I said you have the most beautiful eyes of anybody I've ever seen .
Speaker 2She went home for lunch to her student friends that shared the apartment and said I found the man I was going to marry , so I didn't have a chance Now the reason for that story is she came and became an oncology nurse and when we went to San Francisco she worked for a very famous brain tumor institute , dr Charlie Wilson , and she was his neuro-oncology nurse . The advantage of that was she knew what the specialty was all about . She knew the burden of a call from a patient because she did them for her patients , the brain tumor patients , which require a great deal of empathy as they struggle with their disease . So I had the distinct advantage of somebody that knew what was going on and never gave me grief if I couldn't make Christmas or New Year's Eve party or any sort of social event .
Speaker 2So we had a terrific run .
Speaker 1Yeah , it sounds like confidence has been something that you've had since the get-go . Even with this story , where you're complimenting her eyes and you're surrounded by people who are at the top of their field , you've been described as being legendary . How do you stay grounded ?
Speaker 2Well , in order to need to be grounded , you have to be off the ground in the first place , right ? Right .
Speaker 2I don't think I've ever been off the ground . I know , when I look in the mirror , who I am . I'm one of six children from my parents . I know I have my failings and I've never let my success get in the way of realizing that an incredible portion of my success is due to the people that have surrounded me , Even at home my wife , socially and raising money , et cetera . All of these is really dependent on other people . So I've gotten a lot , a lot of benefit , but when I look in the mirror I know that so that certainly keeps me on the ground .
Speaker 1Keeps you humble . So I want to . You know , we've kind of looked at your past and looked at your mentorship and things like that and we've talked about you , just kind of touched on your successes . So you've built this brain tumor program here and you recruited Dr Bill Shapiro from Sloan-Kettering as the chief of neuro-oncology in 1989 . Are you surprised in how the field has evolved over the years and did you envision a program like the Ivy Center at Burroughs Future ?
Speaker 2Well , let's take one step at a time .
Speaker 2Bill Shapiro . I met when I was giving a talk . Bill Shapiro , I met when I was giving a talk I believe it was in Japan and he was also there from Sloan Kettering , and so they needed a strong chief of neurology and I offered him the job and he wasn't able to accept it at the moment and then he called me back , maybe a year later or something . He said if you still need me , things have changed , personally , in such a way that he thought maybe he needs to come back yeah and so I got him and he built the neuro-oncology program .
Speaker 2The Ivy Center is something really that's totally separate . That came much later and I got to know Catherine very early on , a charming , committed individual whose tragic story with her husband really led her to dedicate the focus of her life and of her resources toward finding a cure for glioblastomas , and I think she's universally admired for her focus and what she has achieved .
Speaker 1Yeah , I think she's changing the way philanthropy for sure , and also the way that research is being conducted and how institutions are running their programs . But to kind of reflect , take a moment of reflection . You know you've built this incredible program here at Barrow . Is there anything you would do differently ?
Speaker 2looking back , oh , a lot of things I'm in retrospect mistakes I would have avoided . But the , the retrospective scope , is never something that I spend a lot of time on .
Speaker 1Yeah .
Speaker 2Because you can't change that . But overall I've obviously been incredibly gratified with the way the BNI has grown , the large additions of personnel that have added to its reputation , so yeah , not interested in the retrospective scope .
Speaker 1Well , we talk about you being a visionary , so you know looking forward . What excites you the most about the field ?
Speaker 2Neurosurgery or neuro-oncology Both Neurosurgery or neuro-oncology . Both .
Excitement in the future of neuro-oncology
Speaker 2Well in neuro-oncology . One of my fellows who came from San Francisco , from an environment where brain tumor was really a focus of the Institute for research as well as treatment , nader Sanai , spent a year with me and his aptitude was very quickly recognized and when he finished he had the options of going to a whole number of programs , the majority offering more lucrative contracts than the one I offered him , but he chose to stay , and so the intersection of Nader Sanai taking on research in brain tumors , bringing in individuals with great research aptitude , really formed a team .
Speaker 2And then , with the incredible coalescence between he and Catherine , to build the Ivy Center as it exists today . That's just . I mean that was never within my vision , right , that was never within my vision , right , but it's a great example of giving somebody that has a lot of talent the reins to control their own destiny .
Speaker 1So that was neuro-oncology . Now what ?
Speaker 2about neurosurgery . It's such an incredibly dispersed field . You can spend all of your time taking care of complex spine problems . On the other hand , you can go all the way over here and put electrodes into the brain . Other hand , you can go all the way over here and put electrodes into the brain into people that are paralyzed and using computer interface to allow them to move their arms , etc . You have radiation in between . There are so many different fields , all of which are progressing , which goes right back to what we started with . Why are they progressing ? It's because of sub-specialization . They are concentrating on this narrow field of neurosurgery and they're pushing the envelope and we are in the stone age of many of these endeavors , like implants into the brain .
Speaker 2It is well within my lifetime that Benabed , a neurosurgeon in France , switzerland , developed the first stimulator to the goals into the brain . That helped Parkinson's patients and now there we are the largest I believe we are still the largest center of implanting these electrodes , with . Dr Ponce made a huge difference , but that field has exploded so far beyond Parkinson's disease and you have things like NeuroPlex , with Musk supporting a new industry and he sees the value of that and first patients that have been done here . This is all part of the incredible advances within this field and it's just galloping along .
Speaker 1Yeah , so I'm going to end this podcast with one last question . Then we normally typically do kind of a rapid fire of just a few couple personal questions , but you've obviously left an indelible mark on neurosurgery and neuro-oncology and so , and honestly , on patients and caregivers and families . You know there are people who are out there who think about you all the time . You know like you're the conversation at family's dinner tables about how you've saved so-and-so's life . So what piece of advice would you give to this is a two-part question to patients and caregivers ? And then what would you give to young residents who are just starting their careers ?
Speaker 2Well to patients and caregivers . First , it would be very important to give due credit to the real workers in this field , in the hospitals . It's the nurses , the technicians , etc . They carry the weight , they do the daily interaction , they do the heavy lifting and when they leave the hospital , whether it's in rehabilitation or at home , and then you have the family support that is so critical for their loved ones that are in peril . And I think there is no specific advice because everybody is different , the situations are different , the degree of deficit is different .
Dr. Spetzler’s reflection on the experience of a neurosurgeon and a reminder to neurosurgery residents
Speaker 2What you do get to experience is you get to see some of the greatest parts of a human being the empathy , the mother that takes care of her invalid son or daughter , the love shown by the support group . It is really . It brings tears to your eyes . Your job , I think , is to let them know that you recognize how hard it is for them and that you want to put them in contact , for example , a social worker that can help facilitate the kind of support that the state provides , government provides , or other that the state provides , government provides or other sections provide For the resident . The advice is don't ever forget the empathy . Think of what this patient is going through as one of your loved ones , and when you do that , you'll have the appropriate empathy and provide them with the best that you can give have the appropriate empathy and provide them with the best that you can give .
Speaker 1That's great advice . So thank you , dr Spetzer , for joining us on today's episode and for all of your insights and for everything you've done for the field in general . It's really incredible and I'm honored to be here today just talking to you , but we always end these episodes with a rapid fire and the kind of theme is that we often hear this phrase one day at a time , one week at a time , one minute at a time . So I'm going to ask you , um , what's your one thing or idea or choice that holds significance to you in the following questions ? So what's one piece of advice you would give to your younger self ?
Speaker 2um be even more empathetic to those in need .
Speaker 1What's one thing people would be surprised to learn about you .
Speaker 2I think that's a very personal question . I'm not sure I balance my neurosurgery with a lot of physical activities skiing , hiking Just like in neurosurgery , I sort of push the envelope . I do the same thing . For example , I did a 207-mile bike race with over three mountain passes from Logan , utah , to Jacksonville , wyoming the longest sanctioned bike race in the world and I won my age group twice . So I'm more proud of that than virtually anything else ?
Speaker 1This is a fierce competitive nature , yeah .
Speaker 2And that is the translation right .
Speaker 1In neurosurgery .
Speaker 2You have to be competitive because you have to get there , and the same thing with physical activity . So that's sort of my balance .
Speaker 1What's one thing you do to de-stress ?
Speaker 2That is what I do to get rid of stress .
Speaker 1What's one habit you'd like to break , what's one habit I would like to break , and and it shouldn't include like doing podcasts with it .
Speaker 2Yeah , I know , that's my habit . I , I , I see um , I , I . There are so many things I'd like to take um , I don't have a specific one .
Speaker 1What's one book you'd recommend everyone reads ?
Speaker 2Oh , I love to read . We have a whole group of individuals , like my brother who was in a biking accident . He and I did this race that I mentioned together and then three months later he was in in a biking accident , became a quadriplegic . He was a orthopedic surgeon , but he's one of the members who loves to read and so we exchange books all the time . But I have a whole group like dr barrow at emory and so on . There are so many books I , I um . Team arrivals is one of those books about Lincoln that I absolutely love . The Making of the Atomic Bomb is another book .
Speaker 2It reads like a novel , but it brings so much history to life .
Speaker 1Yeah , what's one thing you're most proud of ?
Speaker 2My residents and my family .
Speaker 1This one might not be applicable to you , but if you weren't a neurosurgeon , what's one profession you'd want to try , knowing that you've wanted to do this since high school ? Yeah , yeah , there's nothing I'm afraid I'm one of .
Speaker 2That's why I always consider a neurosurgeon that loves this field . Doesn't really work . The real workers are the ones that are in assembly line , the miners that go down in the shafts , who live only for the break that they get and the time for the shift to be done , whereas there's never been a day in neurosurgery that I haven't loved coming to work .
Speaker 1Man , what a blessing . Okay , last one . What's one thing you'd like to be remembered for ?
Speaker 2My progeny , my residents and my fellows , and that they and I gave the best we could for our patients .
Speaker 1Well , thank you so much .
Speaker 2You're welcome .
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