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Earning an M.D. and a Ph.D. in Computer Science
Becoming a Physician Scientist
In May 2022 I became the first person to graduate from Duke University with an MD and a PhD in Computer Science. The process took eight years: three years of medical school and five years of graduate school. One of the most common questions I heard from other students and occasionally professors was “Why are you doing medical school and a Computer Science PhD?” Well, here is a post answering that question! I’ve formatted it as an FAQ based on many conversations I’ve had on the topic. If you’re interested in medicine and computer science, I hope you will consider this training pathway!
Why did you decide to do an MD/PhD? Did you always know you wanted to do an MD/PhD? Did you always like computer science?
The short answer: I decided to do an MD/PhD because by the end of college I wanted to be a doctor and I wanted to do research so I decided to do both. I didn’t learn about MD/PhD programs until I was a senior in college, and I became interested in computer science during college.
The long answer:
When I was a toddler, the first time someone asked me, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” I apparently answered “truck driver” because I loved trucks (especially cement mixers). In elementary school I wanted to be a writer. In high school I wanted to be a marine biologist or a doctor. By the time I got to my freshman year of college, I wanted to be a veterinarian, and signed up for the biology major. The summer after freshman year, I volunteered at a veterinary clinic and ended up deciding that for various reasons veterinary medicine was not for me (although I do love animals).
During my freshman year at Cornell I got involved in research because I thought it would be fun to do science. My first-ever research position was with Dr. John Hermanson in the Cornell vet school. Dr. Hermanson taught me how to dissect bats and I wrote about what muscles of the bat larynx could’ve first contributed to evolution of echolocation. (Dr. Hermanson also had the coolest office/lab ever, full of animal skeletons and papers, including some Tupperwares with animal skeletons actively being cleaned by beetles). I will always be grateful for Dr. Hermanson’s mentorship throughout college.
