Rashaud Senior MD’18
A ‘Rock” For Families
Hometown: Mt. Vernon, NY
Undergrad: Harvard; molecular and cellular biology; premed
Specialty: Family medicine
Residency: Montefiore Medical Center, Albert Einstein College of Medicine
Be the change: “A lot of the work that I did before medical school, as a quality data analyst in a health care company, informed the opportunities available to transform primary care and population health into something that can really change health care as we know it. Rein in those costs and really help people. I’m talking specifically about the poor people, the people who need this kind of work, who need these kinds of solutions.”
Choosing his specialty: “My grandma passed away insecond year, from cancer. It really gave me a lot of insight into the patient perspective. I want to go into family medicine because I want to treat families and help people and be there for them. I may not be the hem-onc doc who’s directly involved, but I will be their primary, I will be the one who’s their rock as they go through things like this. I think it’s powerful to be able to do that for somebody.”
Residency program criteria: “Fit: can I be around these people? Do they suck or not? The quality of the training, of course: I’m thankful to God that the programs I was able to interview at were really solid family medicine programs, so that was less of a thing for me to freak out about. It really came down to how close I am to family. If I’m not going to be close, how’s the weather? How’s quality of life? If I can’t be close to family, then everything else needs to be on point. But if it’s not on point, then I’m going to want to be a little bit closer to family and have that support network, because residency is going to be tough.”
Ready for action: “The thing I’m most excited about will be finally having a job again, and going back to being a semi-adult, who has a paycheck and has health insurance and can build a life again, and not have the rest of his life being on pause.”
On Match Day: “As we all know, med school is hard. But we fight, and we dig deep, and we fight, and we fall many times, then we try to get up. But then you get up the one last time, and look, I made it. It’s Match Day. This is where I find out where I’m going to spend the next however many years. And it’s out of your hands, for better or for worse.”
Watch videos about Rashaud and his classmates at brunonia.brown.edu.
