Enticed then turned off by medicine, Student DO of the Year comes full circle

Looking at his long list of medical- and school-related volunteer activities, it’s not hard to see why the Council of Osteopathic Student Government Presidents named Brian H. Huggins, DO, its Student DO of the Year.

Those same accomplishments, however, obscure the new physician’s once-wary attitude toward his chosen field.

Five years ago, as a senior at West Liberty University in Wheeling, W.Va., Dr. Huggins sat down with his mentor to explore his career prospects. He was drawn to medicine, but he told his mentor he had seen too many physicians “whose behavior didn’t match my philosophy of how to treat people,” he recalls.

His impression formed during hospital visits to see his ill mother who had died a few years before. “Many of the doctors were cold,” Dr. Huggins says. “They didn’t involve the patient in their decision-making. Their attitude seemed to be, ‘If you don’t like what I have to say, there’s the door.’ And to me, that wasn’t good patient care.”

Dr. Huggins’ mentor saw a bright, outgoing science student who was patient with people, and she encouraged him to look into osteopathic medicine. The undergrad didn’t even know what a DO was.

“Once I started learning about the osteopathic philosophy of putting the patient first and focusing on the whole person, I immediately thought, ‘This is what I want to do. This is the personality I have, and this is how I want to practice medicine.’ It all just took off from there,” says Dr. Huggins, who graduated in May from the West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine in Lewisburg.

Physician qualities

Not long after that life-changing conversation, Dr. Huggins enrolled at WVSOM—and started volunteering.

He served as class president and as a member of the student senate during his first year. Subsequent offices included serving as president of WVSOM’s Student Government Association and as student representative to the West Virginia Osteopathic Medical Association. He chaired the Grand Affair, a scholarship fund-raising banquet at WVSOM, and he worked on seven student affairs committees.

To those responsibilities he added community service projects, such as working with the stage crew at the Carnegie Hall arts center in Lewisburg, and directing the Foggy Bottom Festival of Fright, a local children’s Halloween event.

“A lot of people say to me, ‘I don’t know where you find the time,’ ” Dr. Huggins says. “But if I hadn’t done those things, medical school would have been harder than it was. Those activities provided an outlet and let me show my creative side, which helped me be more productive in medical school.”

Dr. Huggins’ honors include WVSOM’s Roland P. Sharp President’s Award and Foundation Award of Excellence for Student Achievement, as well as the President’s Special Award for outstanding service to the school. Lewisburg’s Carnegie Hall also presented Dr. Huggins its 2008 Volunteer of the Year Award.

In April, COSGP named Dr. Huggins its 2011 Student DO of the Year, recognizing his commitment to the osteopathic philosophy and the profession while demonstrating exemplary leadership, professionalism and community service—the capstone award for the once-reluctant physician.

“Brian has a lot of qualities I associate with osteopathic physicians,” says Melinda Kreisberg, PhD, the mentor who turned Dr. Huggins toward a career in osteopathic medicine. “He likes to take the time to get to know people, what makes them tick. He’s not one who would stop at merely identifying a symptom.

“I know he’s looking at becoming a surgeon. He would be the type of surgeon who, after performing a procedure, would make a point of sitting down with a patient’s family members to explain everything and answer their questions.”

Beginning a general surgery internship this month at Wright-Patterson Medical Center near Dayton, Ohio, Dr. Huggins will have an opportunity to do just that—and to start becoming the kind of physician who inspires, not drives away, future physicians.