From Undocumented Immigrant To Future Transplant Surgeon

For Juan Ortiz, 34, the work day starts early and ends late.

“It all depends on the number of cases we have going on,” says Ortiz, a third-year general surgery medical resident at the Riverside University Health System’s Medical Center in Moreno Valley.

It’s a far cry from when, at age 18, he came to the country as an undocumented immigrant from Mexico in search of helping his family out of poverty. Now a naturalized citizen, he recalled taking a bus and then a “pretty scary” illegal border crossing on foot before his uncle in Seattle took him in.

His position as a soon-to-be surgeon is a benefit for both him personally and for an underserved community.

The numbers of Latino physicians is not keeping up with the Latino population, one of the fastest growing ethnic groups in the country, according to a 2015 study from UCLA’s Center for the Study of Latino Health and Culture.

In 1980, there were 135 Latino physicians for every for every 100,000 Latinos in the United States. By 2010, the figure had dropped to 105.

It surprised the researchers to find the 22 percent drop, in a stark contrast to the 49 percent increase in non-Hispanic white physicians over the same 30-year time period. The study highlights a shortage of doctors who have the language and cultural skills to serve such patients in the clinical setting.

The study used U.S. Census data from 1980 through 2010 in five states with large Latino populations: California, Florida, Illinois, New York and Texas.

Dr. Gloria Sanchez, the paper’s lead investigator, believes that the downward trend could have a negative impact on health care for Latinos in the U.S. An associate clinical professor of family medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and faculty member at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, Sanchez said patients may not be able to find appropriate medical care in a language they feel most comfortable.

“And I can tell you that finding a Spanish-speaking transplant surgeon will be very hard to find,” she said of Ortiz.

After a series of menial jobs, Ortiz began taking classes at a local community college at 22 and then transferred to the University of Washington. To become a physician and, more specifically, a surgeon, was not a possibility that he envisioned — at least right away.

At Washington, he studied economics and medicine. He was starting to feel an attraction for the specialty of surgery when, on the first day of Medical School, he observed an open-heart surgery happen right before his eyes. He knew then.

Ortiz was drawn to the Riverside County’s public teaching hospital in Moreno Valley because it serves as the County’s safety net for mostly underserved Latino patients.

“I would say that 60 to 70 percent of the population here are (Latino), low income and with little or no health care coverage,” he said.

After his residency at RUHS-MC, he plans to go on to do a fellowship in transplant surgery, which will take another two years. In total, he will have spent about 15 years to complete his medical career goal, a fact that surprises his parents who still live in Guadalajara, Mexico.

“At first, they did not understand why it took so long but now I think they finally understand,” said Ortiz, explaining that medical school in Mexico starts right after high school and takes six years. “My mom only finished third grade and my dad barely graduated from high school.”

He said he would love to stay and practice in Southern California, but no matter where he practices, he knows this is his calling.

“There is nothing more beautiful than being able to cure a patient’s illness with a surgical procedure,” he said.

PHYSICIANS AND SURGEONS BY THE NUMBERS

Total workforce: 868,476

Average age: 46.7

Estimated job growth: 14 percent

Average yearly wage: $216,097

Top three most common ethnicities: White, Asian, and African American

Source: Data USA



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