{"id":594,"date":"2016-01-22T16:55:42","date_gmt":"2016-01-23T00:55:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/keck.usc.edu\/news\/keck-school-alumnus-reflects-on-50-years-in-medicine\/"},"modified":"2023-11-19T12:08:57","modified_gmt":"2023-11-19T20:08:57","slug":"keck-school-alumnus-reflects-on-50-years-in-medicine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/keck.usc.edu\/news\/keck-school-alumnus-reflects-on-50-years-in-medicine\/","title":{"rendered":"Keck School alumnus reflects on 50 years in medicine"},"content":{"rendered":"\n \n \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
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\n\n \n Press Release<\/span>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n \n \n
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Keck School alumnus reflects on 50 years in medicine<\/h1>\n\n\n<\/div>\n \n \n
\n Melissa Masatani<\/span>\n \n January 22, 2016<\/span>\n <\/div>\n \n \n
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Michael Kennedy, MD<\/figcaption>\n <\/figure>\n \n \n \n\n<\/div>\n \n\n <\/div><\/div>\n\r\n\r\n\n\n \n \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
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Though decades have passed since Michael Kennedy, MD \u201966, MS, first enrolled at USC, he still thinks about the unlikely course of events that led the Chicago native to earning his medical degree from the Keck School of Medicine.
\n\u201cIt was all a surprise,\u201d Kennedy said recently. \u201cI had no idea what to expect because nobody in my family had gone to college.\u201d
\nThe Mission Viejo resident is a father of five, including USC graduates Michael Jr., \u201990, and Kathleen, \u201989, and has five grandchildren. In June, Kennedy published a memoir, \u201cWar Stories: 50 Years in Medicine,\u201d which reflects on his life and career in the operating room through the 20th century. But a career in medicine is not what the retired surgeon originally had in mind.
\nThere were no student loans and few scholarships available to students in the mid-1950s, so the then-high school senior turned down a spot at the California Institute of Technology for a scholarship at USC\u2019s engineering program. After two years at USC, a series of events led him to work at the Douglas Aircraft Company, join the Air National Guard and, following a late-night conversation with roommates at the Playa del Rey beach, apply for medical school. But even that decision had a hiccup, as his National Guard unit got called up one month after he started medical school, delaying enrollment for another year.
\nIn the 50 years since, the medical field has changed drastically. But from Kennedy\u2019s perspective, which included more than 20 years on the surgical faculty at Los Angeles County + USC Medical Center and more than a decade as a professor in the Introduction to Clinical Medicine program at the Keck School, at least one thing has remained the same: high-quality educators.
\n\u201cMy first year of internship, a resident I was working with in the emergency department at (Massachusetts General Hospital) had been an intern at County and he was always telling me rules he had learned at County, he would quote USC faculty for why he did things,\u201d Kennedy said. \u201cAnd I thought, \u2018Wow, he\u2019s a resident at Mass General but he thinks so highly of USC.\u2019 He clued me in that USC faculty were really superior at teaching.\u201d
\nHis time spent teaching first- and second-year medical students prompted him to write his first book, \u201cA Brief History of Disease, Science and Medicine,\u201d in 2004.
\n\u201cEvery year I try to convert at least one of my students to surgery,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s fun when you can influence students, that\u2019s what I love about the classroom.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n\n <\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":595,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"advgb_blocks_editor_width":"","advgb_blocks_columns_visual_guide":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[38],"class_list":["post-594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-press-release","tag-administrative"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nKeck School alumnus reflects on 50 years in medicine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link 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