Provider Pulse Ep. 26: Which Hard to Choose - Dr. Angelo Cabal and Finding Authenticity on the Path to Medicine (Part 2)

Send us Fan MailPart 2: "Which Hard to Choose" (Part 2 of 2)What happens when you do everything “right” and still don’t get in? When two full application cycles pass with no interviews? When you abandoned a degree program only to face rejection?In part two of this Provider Pulse episode, Dr. Angelo Cabal picks up his story in Chicago, where a hard truth and a single conversation with his mentor push him to walk away from an MPH program and start over. Back home in San Diego, Angelo studies for the MCAT, moves in with his parents, and finds the patient-facing work he’d been longing for as a lung cancer clinical research coordinator.But even with strong letters and meaningful experience, two consecutive medical school application cycles end with no interviews. Angelo talks candidly about shame, self-doubt, and the moment he decides to take an expensive leap into a post-bacc program—buoyed by the support of his oncologists and patients who keep asking, “How are your applications going?”From there, he describes finally getting interviews, being accepted to UC Irvine, and discovering that the hardest part was getting in. We follow him through clinical rotations, an away rotation at Harborview Medical Center, and matching into internal medicine in Seattle, where he now cares for immigrants and refugees in the International Medicine Clinic.Angelo closes with a message for anyone who has been rejected, rerouted, or talked themselves out of medicine: never let someone make you feel like you don’t deserve what you want—and seek the mentors who help you believe that you do.Visit EthnoMed.org for additional resources. Follow us on YouTube and Instagram @EthnoMedUW