From migrant worker to brain surgeon
There are so many nasty stories about migrant workers, it's time for a beautiful uplifting one. Meet Dr. Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa, I saw his amazing story on PBS's NOVA...can't stop thinking about it...about how unfairly we judge our fellow man by their circumstances, the color of their skin.
"He jumped the fence from Mexico to work as a farmhand and ended up a leading brain surgeon."
"The Johns Hopkins brain surgeon and cancer researcher talks about what inspires him, how he prepares for an operation, and more."
You can watch the 10 min. video, it includes a brain surgery to remove a golf ball sized tumor with the patient talking the entire time so Dr. Q would know that he wasn't removing anything affecting the speech.
"Dr. Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa first came to the United States illegally as a migrant farmworker in 1987. Since then, he has received an undergraduate degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and a medical degree from Harvard, graduating with honors and becoming a U.S. citizen shortly thereafter.
During his residency in neurosurgery at the University of California, San Francisco, he also completed a postdoctoral fellowship in developmental and stem cell biology.
He is currently Associate Professor of Neurosurgery and Oncology at Johns Hopkins Medical School, where he serves as the Director of the brain tumor program at the The Johns Hopkins Bayview campus.
Dr. Q, as his students affectionately call him, performs more than 250 brain surgeries each year and conducts research on the role that stem cells may someday play in fighting brain cancer and helping patients regain neurological function."
