Diana Hurwitz, AB 1987

I knew I wanted to be a physician since I was about five years old. I came from a family of doctors, and initially I thought I was going to be a psychiatrist. I went to Medical School to go into psychiatry, and I actually matched in psychiatry, but at that point I realized that the focus was almost exclusively on psychopharmacology. I took three courses on Freud in College, so I was more interested in the psychotherapeutic aspect of psychiatry, not to the exclusion of psychopharmacology, but in addition to it. I pivoted at the last minute and decided to go into dermatology, informed by my Fine Arts or art history degree from Harvard. The focus on the visual arts really had been such a dynamic and effective education for me. It has given me joy to this day as an art appreciator and an art collector. I knew that I didn’t want to major in a hard science. I wanted to be a humanities concentrator. I found a wonderful, cohesive, small group of people  in the Art History Department and took all my classes in the Fogg Museum. It felt like home to me.  However,  when I discussed my concentration plans with my pre-med advisor at the time, unfortunately, it was met with a lot of negativity. He told me I could never get into Medical School as a humanities concentrator.  But I decided to stick to my guns and worked alternative summers at NYC museums helping to curate modern art shows. My goal to go to medical school never wavered. Fortunately, my premed advisor was wrong, and I did get in.

I have many people to thank on my journey to med school.  We all have different people who have been our cheerleaders and have had our back and without them and their support it is very difficult to continue the long and hard trajectory of medicine. The art history department was composed of just the warmest, loveliest people. I remember getting the keys to the photography collection and being told to just have at it. It was an exercise in trust, and it was like having the keys to the castle and getting to do explore.  That faith and trust  made a big impact on me. I also did research in College, and I was involved in psychopharmacology research for an antidepressant medication,  Prozac. It was the first serotonin reuptake inhibitor for depression, and I was working with a psychiatrist and reproductive endocrinologist at Mass General. I actually took a year off between college and med school to continue because it was on the cusp of being approved. They were big supporters as well.

I grew up in New York, and a big part of my time on the weekends was spent going to galleries and museums. Art was something that was very valued by my family and the community at large. I consider it to be another mode of communication and expression. The arts really inform how to create a relationship with somebody. Sometimes you have to take a very circuitous path to engage with people, and to gain their trust, you have to look at things from different perspectives. When you’re a practicing physician, you really have to join with the patient and meet them where they are. Sometimes, you have to egg them on to do things they don’t want to do. How do you approach a smoker who smokes three packs a day for 40 years and have a discussion about why it is important for them to quit? You have to be pretty creative. What’s most important is being open and curious. You just have to take a breath and sink into it.

One of my goals in life is to have balance and have activities or opportunities that spark ( I realize I sound like Marie Kondo) a lot of joy and happiness to your life. That means different things for different people. For me, it’s been a hard year where museums and Broadway shows are closed, but I’m very excited for things to be opening back up. I think the balance of trying to juggle things that may not be so goal oriented but are just nourishing to an individual is really important. Life is to be enjoyed. If you’re only working and stressed and unhappy, it doesn’t serve you and it doesn’t serve who you’re working with more.

I found that for a lot of my colleagues in college who didn’t have the support I had of people in medicine, they didn’t always stay the course and I think that was to the detriment of the medical community. There are a lot of people who have a tremendous amount to offer and they get dissuaded because they don’t have somebody they can turn to and lean on when they stumble. The impetus behind this “All In” HAIH mentorship is to provide a kind of buddy system, to encourage people not to get dissuaded  if things aren’t as seamless as you hope for. We will aim to provide an outlet  or an encouraging ear  and to help remain  positive and focus on the overall goal without losing sight of enjoying the college experience.  There’s a lot of hoops you have to jump through as  a means to an end to apply to med school and these hoops really have little to do with the practice of medicine.  It’s just courses you have to take. Your grade here does not define you. If you want to be a pediatrician, it’s about your relatability to parents and kids who are looking up to you. Can you relate, can you be empathetic, can you make a really good joke? These are the most important skills. For mentors who are interested in engaging with the next generation: whatever you give you get back, and you get back probably in spades. It’s really nice to help pass the baton and raise somebody else up.

Diana Hurwitz

AB 1987 | Fine Arts

Dermatologist 

Interviewed and Compiled by Felicia Ho