Hello Student Doctors! I’m glad you’re here. I’m Marcin. 

My long and twisted journey into Medicine, and ultimately Trauma Surgery, started while performing CPR in the back of an ambulance. I was an EMT (while in College) and we just picked up an elderly gentleman with signs of trauma, who was found down without a pulse. I remember doing compressions on him, for what felt like, hours in the back of the rig. When we arrived in the ER, we were quickly directed to the trauma bay. After transferring my patient to the ED stretcher, I remember standing in the corner of the room watching the trauma surgeon confidently and swiftly guide the resuscitation team and thinking to myself “Yeah, I want to be like him, and I want to do that!”

I was still considering pursuing clinical research at the time, so I decided to spend a year as a research fellow at the NIH in Bethesda, Maryland, to see if this was truly what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. I quickly came to the realization that I wanted to help real patients. It was then, I decided to apply to medical school. 

My first year of medical school was very overwhelming. I felt completely unprepared for the amount of work that was required and struggled with balancing all my priorities. I also struggled with the famous “imposter syndrome”. I suddenly found myself surrounded by others who I thought were much smarter and better than me. I often compared myself to others around me and questioned my own intellect, my work ethic and my true commitment. I wasn’t sure I belonged or deserved to be there, let alone deserved to be a physician. I felt that in order to survive and make it, I had to outcompete and outwork everyone around me. Although I was able to adjust quickly and excel academically in medical school, I still felt anxious, isolated and unsure about my future. I was constantly asking myself “Am I going to make it?” I felt like I was constantly in “fight or flight” mode, going from one exam to the next, barely surviving. After all, this is what med school is supposed to be like, right?

I often found the process of looking and asking for physician or faculty advice, guidance and mentorship to be very difficult and intimidating. I sought out mentorship and advice, but found it to be superficial, sporadic, fragmented and short-lived. 

I was fortunate enough to have a few mentors who helped me realize my passion for surgery and treating the critically ill and severely injured. I completed my General Surgery residency and Surgical Critical Care fellowship, knowing that this was my true calling. It has now been over 15 years, and I still love what I do, each and every day, as a practicing Trauma/Emergency General Surgeon & Surgical Critical Care Intensivist. I have also been fortunate to serve as a Surgical Residency and Clerkship Site Director as well as a General Surgery Residency Interviewer. I have been the Chief of Trauma & Surgical ICU Medical Director at several institutions and have had the privilege of being a member of The Board of Examiners for General Surgery and Surgical Critical Care certifying written and oral board examinations. 

Yet, out of all my personal & professional achievements throughout my career, the most fulfilling & rewarding has been that of a medical student educator, advisor & mentor. As an attending physician/surgeon and an advisor and mentor to hundreds of medical students, I find that there is now a bigger and more urgent need for physician-lead guidance, support, advice, and mentorship for our future physicians. And I feel each of you needs it now more than ever!  

Our great profession is now more complex, more fragmented and more unpredictable than ever before. It is ever-changing and moving at a much faster pace. Most importantly, there is more pressure on each and every one of you, more than ever before. And now, the COVID-19 pandemic has further isolated all of you from your support systems – your home institutions, your undergraduate medical education, from each other, and most importantly from potential physician mentors. 

This was my motivation to form DocDocMentors. A safe and supportive virtual medical student community and networking platform, where each of you can have easy and direct access to real practicing-physician mentors. A space where you can go for support, guidance, advice, networking, inspiration, empowerment and mentorship. A resource you can tap into and access anytime, and from anywhere. 

I look forward to sharing and supporting your personal and professional journey to success!