Laura Dean MD ’18
From the West Wing to Mass General
Hometown: Bethesda, MD
Undergrad: Harvard; women’s studies major, government minor; premed
Specialty: Emergency medicine
Residency: Massachusetts General Hospital,Harvard Medical School
Path to medicine: “I did an internship at the White House, for the National Economic Council. I was planning to start med school when I got hired as one of Obama’s speechwriters. And then I deferred, and I deferred, and I deferred, again and again. Until Brown said, your MCAT has expired, you haven’t taken a science class in five years—are you coming to medical school? I’m coming! I promise, that’s what I want to do.”
Wait. Back up. You were Obama’s speechwriter? “I was 22—I’m like, is this real life? I wrote Obama’s speech when the statue of Rosa Parks was installed in Statuary Hall. It was particularly meaningful to him. He’s really funny. He’s just a guy—someone’s father and husband. I’m lucky I did a 180 career-wise. If the coolest thing you do is at 25, what do you do next?”
Choosing her specialty: “I went through every clerkship and I wanted to be every kind of doctor. It’s like trying on wedding dresses where they all make you look beautiful and they’re all great, and then you try on one, and it’s like, oh, that one’s just better than all the other ones for me. And so when I did my emergency medicine rotation, it was just clear.”
Residency program criteria: “I expect over the next four years to get the clinical basis and exposure that I need to be a great doctor and practice in any setting. My number one goal in residency is not to get divorced. We’re not couples matching, but we’re couples matching because we’re matching as a couple and that’s the deal.”
Med school experience: “I am a total evangelist for medical school. I had the best time. I loved every rotation I went on because the residents and the attendings made that experience worthwhile and engaging for me, and I just feel really grateful to have been at a place that made medical school really fun instead of some terrible slog that it’s mythologized to be.”
Watch videos about Laura and her classmates at brunonia.brown.edu.
