920. A Day in the Life–What's It Really Like to Be a Physician?

Dr. Erika Blank

“I realized that I was seeing patient after patient and they were on 10 medicines, maybe more. They couldn’t keep them straight. I couldn’t keep them straight. And all had diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol. They may have had a heart attack in the past. And what I realized was that it didn’t have to be that way. They didn’t have to have type two diabetes; they didn’t have to have those heart attacks—those illnesses could have been prevented if they had been leading more healthy lives beforehand. And I realized after practicing medicine for 18 years that all I had ever been taught in medical school and in residency was how to treat diseases. We never learned how to keep people healthy.”

Dr. Erica Blank graduated from medical school at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx in 1996. She then completed a residency in internal medicine at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York. Her first job was at Beth Israel Medical Center in New York where she worked as a primary care physician. She moved to New Hampshire in 2012 where she worked at Exeter Hospital and developed an interest in Lifestyle Medicine, which focuses on treating the root causes of disease. She realized that all of her training in medicine up to that point was about treating disease and she never learned how to promote health. Erika became board-certified in Lifestyle Medicine in 2017, and moved to Charleston, South Carolina, where she now practices Lifestyle Medicine at the Medical University of South Carolina.

The Most Impactful Turning Point?

“I did a medical education course in 2016 through Harvard on Lifestyle Medicine. This was all about treating the root cause of diseases to try to prevent diseases by having healthy lifestyle behaviors through a healthy diet, physical activity, stress management, getting healthy sleep, and obviously not smoking or drinking or doing drugs. This made sense to me and I realized that I was seeing patient after patient and they were on 10 medicines, maybe more. They couldn’t keep them straight. I couldn’t keep them straight. And all had diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol. They may have had a heart attack in the past. And what I realized was that it didn’t have to be that way. They didn’t have to have type two diabetes; they didn’t have to have those heart attacks—those illnesses could have been prevented if they had been leading more healthy lives beforehand. And I realized after practicing medicine for 18 years that all I had ever been taught in medical school and in residency was how to treat diseases. We never learned how to keep people healthy.”

The Most Powerful Lessons Learned?

1. Get guidance as soon as you are able, beginning in high school. There are myriad assessments and programs that help you understand who you are from every perspective so that your decisions about college, areas of study and possible career options are based on reflection and experience, not merely whim.

2. Instead of entering medical school directly from college, I’d suggest getting more life experience—travel, get a job in a field that interests you—anything to broaden your perspective.

3. Explore. Talk to family and friends and ask them to introduce you to doctors they know—ask them if you can visit their offices to interview them, get a feel for what they do all day and how they feel about what they do—the ins and outs.

4. Push your boundaries. I’m an introvert, so once I began meeting with patients during my residency, I had to create the mindset and develop the skills to manage my energy and present my best self to the patient.

5. Trust your instincts. I was interested in surgery early on but realized that a career standing on my feet all day long would be stressful and enervating. So, I focused on internal medicine and that has been my love throughout my entire career.