A child of Central American immigrants, KPSOM student Jose Barrera initially planned to become a firefighter in his community before his real-world experiences responding to life-threatening situations inspired him to take an interest in medicine. In recognition of Latine Heritage Month at KPSOM, we asked Jose about his journey to medicine and Latine representation in medicine in the following interview.
Why did you want to become a doctor?
My journey to medicine began while riding on fire trucks and admiring the lights reflecting off the buildings during our nightly 911 calls. As a young Firefighter Cadet in my hometown of City Heights [a neighborhood in San Diego, California], it was my goal to become a positive change in my community, where the biggest role models I had growing up were from local gangs. The thrill of heading into the unknown drove me to heed the advice of my firefighter mentors, study hard from my EMT textbooks, and to use my Spanish to help my fellow community members, as I was often the only Spanish speaker on the crew. To succeed here meant to use everything that I knew at the time, while also learning something new from every call.
I often wondered what would happen to our patients after we transferred their care over to the hospital. I wondered if patients had someone within the hospital to advocate for them and give them a voice in a place where they didn’t have one. To find this out for myself, I traded my cadet uniform for a volunteer shirt at a local emergency room. During my shifts, I found striking similarities between firefighters and Emergency Medicine physicians: They were both available 24 hours a day, they were both incredible team players, and they both used everything they knew to help others. From headaches to broken bones to gunshot wounds, I admired the physicians’ abilities to always know what to do and the ways their patients trusted them with their lives. I knew this was the career I wanted to pursue.
From the moment I gave up my Firefighter Cadet uniform to the moment I got my KPSOM white coat took twelve years. Now, as a second-year medical student on clinical rotations, my drive to become a doctor continues to grow with every patient encounter. I look forward to the growth I will experience in these next few years, which will allow me to serve my community in the best way I can imagine, by using everything I know as a physician.
Was there a specific person who inspired you to go to medical school? Or a specific event that was the catalyst to pursuing a career in medicine?
My family immigrated to the U.S. from Honduras and their struggles to make it here, to give my family a better life, has not been lost on me. They headed into a new world with no roadmap on how to make it and no promise of making it at all. To me, that level of courage is inspiring and has served as a foundation for pursuing my dreams of going to medical school. Being the first person in my family to go to college and medical school, I entered my own journey into uncharted territory so that I can pave the way for generations to come, just like my family did when they immigrated to the U.S.
Are there any Latine medical leaders who inspire you?
As someone with Honduran roots, it is rare that I see my family’s native flag shown on the world stage. When I learned about Dr. Salvador Moncada, I was immediately inspired. His work on discovering the physiologic importance of nitric oxide and metabolism is fascinating, and it fills me with a great sense of pride to know that contributions to our fund of knowledge in medicine are because of Latino scientists.
Furthermore, I am so blessed to receive constant inspiration directly from Latino medical leaders at KPSOM. I have had the pleasure to learn from amazing teachers such as Drs. Gabriel Lopez, Rosaysela Santos, and José Barral-Sanchez in our Scientific Basis of Healthcare courses; from Dr. Lisa Montes through her mentorship to the Latino Medical Student Association and MiMentor; and in my clinical rotations by my Family Medicine preceptor, Dr. Abbas Naqvi. They have all been incredibly generous with their time, their grace, and their teaching as I develop into a physician. My hope is to one day have that same impact on the generation of healers that come after me.
What are some ways we can champion Latinx medical students and physicians as they pursue careers in medicine?
I believe that supporting us by shoutouts like this give us a platform to inspire and connect with each other, and hopefully inspire someone watching to pursue this career path. Going through my undergraduate years often being the only Latino student in my STEM classes was very isolating and I wish I had a platform to see other Latinos thriving in the spaces of higher education, so having these highlights is great to see. The more Latino representation there is in the physician workforce, the more our future patients will benefit from it, and this is a great start!
