On Thursday of last week I interviewed Dr. Perfect in his office. It was really nice to see him in person. Much of what I learned described his position and general motivation behind it. Dr. Perfect is both a physician and a principal investigator, so he spends a lot of his time balancing the two. He’d always wanted to become a physician because the clinical connections and seeing different kinds of patients allowed him to see the relevance in the research he’s doing. Conducting or being apart of research is known to have a point where the purpose becomes a bit fuzzy, so he feels that having both roles really aids him in keeping himself focused.
He also gave some really valuable advice. Making the best of my college experience here at Duke would mean optimizing every opportunity around me to learn more and gain more experiences. This means building relationships with professors, staying productive over the summer, and always asking questions. He also added that going to graduate school or medical school will potentially be apart of my journey, but it is important to note that large motivation should be to genuinely want learn more and to help people. Especially in reference to graduate school, it takes much of your time and having a blurred vision of what you want to do isn’t an optimal mindset to have when entering grad or med school.
