Dr. Ivy Huang

AV: What impact has mentorship had on your surgical career?

IH: It's made a really big difference for me, especially as surgery was originally not on my radar. When I did my rotation, my chief resident was really focused on my education. I felt like there was someone who was invested in my learning and I was really inspired by that. I also had a lot of female mentors. One of my most loved mentors, Areti Tillou, a trauma surgeon at UCLA, really took me under her wing in starting my research career in surgical education. She was always sponsoring me at conferences and introducing me to people while also making sure I wasn’t getting overwhelmed. You could just tell that she really loved what she did and she was such a great role model for women in surgery. There are countless people on the journey who taught me some little thing or helped me figure out what I wanted and helped me get there.

AV: What is your favorite thing about surgery?

IH: I just love the feeling that you have solved someone's problem and you’ve fixed something. It's really rewarding to be able to do something that very few people in the world can do, and to do something that really helps a person immediately. 

When you do surgery and then you subspecialize and everyone around you is a surgeon, you kind of forget that what you and very few people can do. My husband, who is not in medicine, always reminds me of that. I’ll do surgery where it seems so straightforward. It's a small right-sided colon cancer, and I remove it and put them back together. That was two, three hours of my life. But I’ve cured this person of cancer. We shouldn't forget that what we do is incredible and life-changing and very few people have the opportunity to make this big of a positive difference.

AV: What are you most proud of personally and/or professionally?

IH: My family and my kids. I remember seeing mothers in medical school and residency and thinking “That might be me one day. I need to figure out how they're doing it and do it too.” My husband and I had our first child in my PGY-6 year. I remember there were days that were so hard. You think that residency is tiring after being on call for 28 hours. But when you are pregnant, you come home and just fall asleep on the couch even on a light work day. 

I had my second son in fellowship. I remember being proud of myself for having asked for what I needed and just doing it. My fellowship was so supportive. So I'm most proud of my kids and being able to get to this point as a first-year attending with two young kids and still being able to make it all work.

AV: If you hadn't become a surgeon, what would you have become?

IH: When I was asked this during med school interviews, I said I would be a veterinarian. But I think I would prefer to work in wildlife rehab. I love animals and I love that sense of nurturing something and helping it get better. That's one of the main reasons why I went into medicine and surgery. Wildlife rehab is one of those fields where you're helping another being regain function and be able to survive out in the wild. It's very similar to surgery but in a different capacity.

AV: What is the best piece of advice you have received?

IH: You can only do the best with what you've gotten. This advice was related to how you deal with complications after a surgery. You need a support group like friends or colleagues you can talk to, but you also have to understand that if you did what you thought was the best thing for the patient every step of the way, and a complication still happened, you have to forgive yourself. 

Another piece of surgical advice is you have to know where your point of no return in an operation is. There's a lot of branch points where you can keep going and it's not going to commit you to something that you can't find a way out of. You always need to have an exit strategy.

AV: What is one thing that you know now that you wish you had known during training?

IH: At every stage in your life, you think, ‘This is the hardest thing I've ever been through.’ And then you look back and think, ‘That wasn't that bad; I got past it and I grew.’ Now, looking back, all I remember are the fond memories, the interesting questions I was asked, and the places that I got to travel to. One thing that I would tell myself, and it's so cliche, is to really enjoy the journey and the people you meet and the things you learn along the way. Try to not be so stressed about everything. It's going to be okay.

AV: What are your hobbies outside of the hospital?

IH: I love spending time with my family but, if it was just me, I love trying out new restaurants. I recently got back into reading with my sister. I really enjoy reading science fiction, thriller, and fantasy. I like to cook and crochet. I love crosswords and trivia — lifelong learner, right?

AV: What inspires you to do what you do?

IH: The answer looks very different before kids and after kids. Now, it’s definitely my children, my husband, and family. For my kids to see their mom be a surgeon and help people feel better, makes me want to keep going, get better at what I do, and be someone for them to look up to. 

Before I had kids, what really inspired me were my friends. They’re all so smart and hardworking. Just wanting to be someone they were proud to know, and someone I could be proud of myself, definitely inspired me to keep going. My biggest inspiration is to be useful and helpful to other people in the greater community.