Graduation 2014 Profiles: Jose Ramirez

By Joseph Neighbor

Students applying for residency have to consider not only finding the right program; they also hope to find the right city in which to live. Starting over in a new place can be a frightening proposition.

But Jose Ramirez is one of those restless souls accustomed to moving and starting anew. Born in the Dominican Republic, he has lived in El Salvador, Venezuela, and the Philippines. He went to high school in Austin, Texas, and college at Brown University in Rhode Island, where he studied neuroscience, pharmacology, and physiology. After working in finance in Miami, he came to New York to attend P&S. As a seasoned traveler, he is perhaps better prepared than some for a big move to start his residency.

“I applied broadly, not only in terms of the types of programs, but also geography,” he says. His first priority was finding a place where both he and his fiancée, Laura Snizek, would want to live. “I’m very flexible; I applied to academic programs, community programs, public-private partnerships. And I have some sort of connection to all the places I applied.”

He is pursuing orthopedic surgery, like his older brother Miguel, chief resident at Baltimore’s Union Memorial Hospital. “He was someone whom I could always ask questions, someone who could lend support,” he says. “And of course it helps to be able to see up close what this specialty is really all about.”

Mr. Ramirez considers himself a “goal-oriented person”; he found appealing the fact that orthopedic surgery has tangible results, outcomes. For his research project, he and three other students rewrote Columbia’s dissection text. “The Clinical Gross Anatomy Dissection Manual” uses iPads to instruct medical students in the age-old arts of dissection and anatomy. The project was featured last fall in the Wall Street Journal.

On Match Day, Mr. Ramirez found out he will be returning to a place he knows well: He was accepted into the orthopedics program at Rhode Island Hospital/Brown University in Providence, where he studied as an undergraduate.

Though he is undaunted by starting fresh in a new place, in his personal relationships, he is anchored. He prizes family and is always aware of how his professional choices affect his loved ones. “It’s important for medical students to realize their careers are a reflection not only of their work, but also their parents and all the people who came before them,” he says. “Without their support, none of this would be possible.”