November 29, 2023 • 53 mins
Dr. Abdeen, a former MMA fighter turned paramedic, now ER physician, shares the exciting transition between his diverse careers. Celebrating completion of his emergency medicine training month; We discuss our first month being a doctor, preparing to begin residency, anticipation of critical care rotations, and the imprints our families leave on our professional choices. A highlight of our conversation is Dr. Abdeen's insight into the emotional and technical aspects of the IVF process. His openness about the trials and tribulations he and his wife faced during their IVF journey is both enlightening and deeply moving. Enjoy!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Hello everybody and welcome to the Off-White Coat
podcast.
I'm your host, jordan Amney,and today we got a big one.
This man has worn many hats hewas a paramedic, an MMA fighter
and is now the new ER physicianat the University of Mississippi
Medical Center.
I would like to welcome myfriend, my co-resident, dr Corey
Abdeen.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Just finished our orientation month for emergency
medicine residency they call itOPM at the University of
Mississippi Medical Center inJackson, Probably one of the
better places in the country todo an EM residency.
I'm from here.
I grew up in Jackson.
Hold on hold on.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
This man is amazing, guys, I want to let you know.
So I did do your intro, butthen I was just seeing if I
could get the mic.
I was just trying to get themic perfectly in front of his
face.
I asked him to start talking.
He essentially starts the show.
Great way to start it.
He gave us the full background.
I follow instructions well, he'sgoing to be a good one.
(01:08):
So this is my friend and nowco-resident, dr Corey Abdeen.
As he said, we had justfinished OPM, which is the
training month for the emergencyresidents.
We got a full month of where weessentially did a bunch of
simulations.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Yeah, we kind of learned a little bit of what
we're doing before they send usoff to the wolves.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Yeah, you officially got your training wheels taken
off.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
You're going to start in the emergency room right,
Yep.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
And then this guy, he has the rough schedule, the
rough schedule in the medicalICU.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
I think you get four days off for the month and I'm
trying to have a baby in themiddle of all that.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
It's going to be a wild month.
We've got a lot to break downbecause you have a lot of
exciting things starting.
You've got the license to kill,you're about to be up in the
mic you Exactly, and he is aboutto be a father.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Well, we're willing, man.
Hopefully it'll work out.
We're doing a embryo transfer,secondary to having done IVF, so
we're both very excited aboutit.
We already know it'spotentially going to be a little
boy, so Wait, wait, wait.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Oh so y'all made the decision.
They had a coin flip, Yep.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Well, we had a boy and a girl embryo.
We knew that going in becausewe did gene testing and our
physician, our doctor, told usthat the highest grade embryo,
sort of a subjective scoringsystem.
They used to sort of say, oh,this embryo is higher quality
than the other one.
He wanted the higher qualityembryo, which is so happened to
be the boy, which I'm not sadabout.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
Yeah, he's like yeah, I knew my boy would be the
better quality embryo.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
I mean, I feel like every man to some degree, if you
want kids has a dream of havinga son when they pass it on the
lineage.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
Dude, that's exciting and that's literally happening
this week, so I bet your nerveshave got to be up in the air.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
I'm very nervous.
I'm nervous because I want itto happen.
I'm also nervous because Ireally want it to work out for
my wife Infertility if anybodyever has to go through it, it's
a rough thing, particularly withyour wife person.
You love having to watch themgo through.
That's not an easy thing.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
Yeah, I mean, it can be just totally random.
It happens on Tuesday, rightyeah?
Speaker 2 (03:15):
She has to go back for another round of blood tests
to check her estrogen andprogesterone levels.
I mean, it gets real trickywith the timing and the hormone
levels have to be just right.
There's a window forimplantation.
We could spend the wholepodcast just talking about IVF.
I've sort of become a de factoexpert, yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
We did the transvaginal ultrasounds.
Corey was a pro.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Oh yeah, oh yeah, he's like.
I've seen you before.
There's a lot of them.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
It's awesome, though, because you had mentioned and
that was what I was going to sayis that when they checked both
of you, there was nothing goingon.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
Yeah, so we had what they call unexplained or no
diagnosis infertility.
So she didn't really have anyobvious issues, no problems with
the uterus.
She was effectively making eggs.
My sperm count was normal.
There's really no indication asto why we've had trouble, which
is actually more common thanyou would think.
In fact don't necessarily get adiagnosis.
(04:12):
So it kind of makes it tough,though, because it's better to
have answers sometimes, becausesometimes having an answer makes
it at least make a little moresense.
But in this case you're goingthrough the IVF process.
If there's a step that youcouldn't really identify as a
problem, it will kind of come tolight during an IVF process.
But you sort of have to gothrough every step, make the
(04:34):
embryo, everything has to goright on that end, all the
things.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
Yeah, they told you you were old and everything yeah
we're both geriatric in thepregnancy world being over 35.
That's exciting.
So you were giving herinjections.
I mean it's got to be goodhaving a husband that's in
healthcare, that can.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
I guess.
So I guess it was helpful thatat least I've used needles
before and at least given somemeds before.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Yeah, Corey has actually been one of the main
sources, like a pillar thatwe've leaned on heavy during
OPIM, because he was in medicinefor many years, even before
medical school.
Because you were a paramedic,yeah, yeah, and then he was
putting people in ambulancesright before that.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Yeah.
Yeah, my pathway to medicalschool was sort of a long,
convoluted one, but yeah, Istarted out kind of doing a
little professional mixedmartial arts, kind of rounded
back to doing some paramedictraining, emt training.
I was new, I wanted to go tomedical school, but when I was
younger didn't really think itwas for me.
Or really not that it wasn'tfor me, I just didn't think that
(05:40):
I was smart enough to do it.
I guess I proved myself wrong.
Here we are.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Yeah, we'll let Corey be the leader for this one.
It's a baby where like, hmm,course, probably needs to leave.
Speaker 2 (05:54):
Yeah, it's, uh, it's been a fun journey, though I
mean.
I kind of I kind of look at yoursituation is similar to mine in
the sense that the path you hadto take to get here is very
admirable, took a lot of work,you had to do a lot of things
that a lot of people didn't haveto do, so more is having to do
all the traveling you did andhit a little on an island.
I have a lot of respect forthat man.
(06:14):
I like you a lot, I likeeverybody in our class a lot,
but I expect big things from you, man.
I think you're going to dogreat Big expectations.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
I love those.
Yeah, no, I want to take Iwouldn't change it for anything
in the world.
The hardships kind of make youand so sometimes when you put
yourself in uncomfortablesituations, you kind of rise
Absolutely, you raise the bar alittle bit and so I'm excited.
We got a great group ofco-residents.
Corey, you're probably actuallylike my first friend, because
(06:44):
we met during like the interviewday and we did like the tour
together.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Yeah, that's right.
That's right.
Yeah, we met.
We both had the same interviewday.
I had just finished an auditionrotation, or sub-eye, whatever
you want to call it.
I think the last day of mysub-eye was my interview and
that was also the day that I metyou.
I even remember telling you Iwas like you're going to get in,
we're both going to end up here, I'll see you in a few months.
Yeah, not to be on horn, but Iwas right.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
He really was.
He knew everybody there and hesaid the magic words to me where
he was like trust me.
So first off, I see him shakinghands with everybody, so I
already know that he knows atleast the day-to-day operations
at this place.
And then he looks at me andhe's like you're going to see
some shit, oh yeah.
But at the end of it you'regoing to have the best training
(07:32):
he's like and I know you'll getin.
And I was like I have morefaith in you than myself.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
He knows this, he knows the process, and look at
us now.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
Yeah, look where you ended up.
And yeah, going back to sort ofwhat you were saying a second
ago about Jackson Mississippi, Istill stand by that.
One of the unique things aboutdoing medicine here in
Mississippi is we sort of have alot of distinctions that are
not necessarily the best ones.
We're the least healthy state.
We have the highest infantmortality rate.
We've got the sickest people.
(08:03):
Jackson Mississippi also, Ithink, currently is the second
or third highest murder percapita in the country.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
I think they said that it was the third homicide
rate.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
It's a lot.
There's a lot of gun violence,a lot of penetrating trauma,
also a lot of very acute medicalcases where it's not just heart
failure.
It's people have multiplechronic conditions on top of
whatever exacerbation they'rehaving that leads them into the
emergency room.
So you're kind of doing medicineat a super high level.
You're having to think you'renot just fixing one problem,
(08:34):
you're always, at the very least, fixing a problem on top of
several other problems.
So things kind of get tricky.
Like I said, we talked aboutearlier a lot of gun violence,
which is never fun, a lot ofpediatric trauma.
That's never fun to deal witheither, but as an emergency
medicine doctor, you need to beable to take care of it all, and
Jackson provides that.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
Yeah, when I heard it and I saw it in full effect, it
was quite impressive, like justthe campus in general.
I couldn't say no.
So that's I mean, you're aMississippi man too, so he's the
person to actually get yourinformation from.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Yeah it's.
I grew up here, been here bypretty much my entire life, went
to undergrad up in NorthMississippi, spent most of my
time in Jackson.
Now I'm back in Jackson, met mywife here.
She's a transplant fromPensacola, florida.
She went to the PA program.
That's in Clinton, mississippi,right side of Jackson.
So yeah, my wife and I arepretty much all in on medicine.
(09:29):
My mom is in the yard nurse atBaptist hospital, which is
another thing.
It's a level three traumacenter down the street from UMC.
My wife works at anotherhospital, st Dominic's, which is
right next door to UMC, whichis a level two, maybe three,
trauma center.
So yeah, my life pretty muchrevolves around emergency
medicine.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
So I'm excited about kind of getting to finally be
not to get confused with theyeah, dude, you're about to be a
lot of transplants that makeyou a lot of transplants going
on today, but that's the themeof this week, this upcoming week
.
That's right Now.
I did want you've got a toughschedule to start off with, so
they eased us in the first roundin the ER.
(10:10):
Corey, on the other hand, hashis first away rotation and, if
you're not familiar with it,usually in all three years of
your residency you're you'regoing through rotations where
you're not just in the ER.
If you're in emergency positionor anesthesia, they're not
always doing that You're indifferent parts of the hospital,
and so Corey is going to theMiki, which is the medical ICU
(10:31):
where the sick adults go.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
Yeah, so all those sick DKA patients, heart failure
, all the sick people you see inthe emergency room a lot of
them end up in the Miki.
So you know if you're in theMiki by virtue of that, that
you're probably not doing well.
I'm excited about it.
It's one of the rotations thatinitially, when I found out
that's where I was starting,kind of made me a little nervous
, because I was.
I kind of looked at everybodyelse's schedule.
(10:54):
Everybody else at least has oneother person for more class
with them at the same time.
I'm all by my lonesome as faras I don't have any other
interns with me on this rotation.
I also haven't really done aformal critical care rotation.
I didn't do that in medicalschool.
So that all makes me a littlenervous.
But I know I'm going to learn alot.
(11:16):
The schedule is pretty brutal 12hour shifts.
It's either 6A to 6P or 6B to6A.
You got to get there 30 minutesearly for sign out and you work
.
I think out of a 30 day monthI'm going to work 26 days.
So pretty much, if you want tofind me in the month of August,
come to the Miki at theUniversity of Mississippi
Medical Center and I'll be there.
But I'm kind of hoping that atthe very least I'll get to do a
(11:39):
lot of procedures and I'll learna little bit about vent
management.
I'm not going to touch the ventthat's apparently a rule at UMC
we don't touch it but it'sgoing to be a good opportunity
to learn a lot of things.
So hopefully my next rotationwill be in the emergency room.
So hopefully this month willkind of get me schooled up and
ready to go.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
This is going to be great and you're going to get so
much practice with all thoseprocedures.
Yeah, you don't want to govisit Cory in this next month
Because he's going to be with abunch of very sick people, but I
think you're going to get a tonof experience and even if you
didn't have that formal one likethe learning curve, when you
get thrown into a job whereyou're not sure what's going on
(12:16):
like, you'll start picking upthings and it might just, you
know, like we were just talkingabout, like sometimes, those
hard parts really like boostyour level.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
Absolutely.
It's kind of like gettingthrown into the deep end of a
pool to learn how to swim.
I mean, you're either going tofigure it out or you're going to
just sink to the bottom andfail miserably and I try not to
fail things miserably, at least.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
We believe in baptizing by fire here in
Mississippi.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
I mean we did pick emergency medicine right.
They're definitely easier pass.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
Yeah, but I wouldn't take it any other way.
I love a little chaos.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
I mean, yeah, I kind of think going on that I mean
I'm going to interview theinterviewer.
I think it's really cool thatyour mother is an emergency
medicine physician.
Correct me if I'm wrong, butI'm sure that had some impact on
your decision to pursue thisspecialty.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Yeah, my mom is definitely.
My family in general had a hugeimpact on me wanting to go into
medicine.
That was like all I would hear.
They would come back, be at thekitchen table, we'd be having
dinner and they would just talkabout either somebody sick over
here in the cardiac floor, andmy mom always had like some of
(13:29):
the best stories to begin with,and I got to spend a lot of time
in the emergency room growingup.
There was probably even at like15, 16, I would just be hanging
out there.
Sometimes they would be like,yeah, every now and then, you
know, if somebody had to show me, show me something that needed
to be seen, like one time theywere afraid am I getting into
(13:51):
drugs or whatever.
So they took me into like thepsych holding cell.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
And let me interview one of the drugs.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
So you can see firsthand.
This is what it would look likeif you did get bad off in the
drug.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
I never touched another oxy-cot.
Yeah, I think that's reallycool man.
Speaker 2 (14:08):
I don't really have any other physicians in my
family, but my mom is the personwho sort of got me into
medicine.
She started her career out.
She's worked her whole careerat the Baptist Hospital in
Jackson.
I was also born there and mymom worked there in the ER for
10, 15 years.
Then she was a case manager,then she was internal medicine.
She was like a hot nurse forthe hospitalist.
(14:30):
She's done a little bit ofeverything there, but my mom is
a rock star.
She's one of the people thatwanted to go to medical school
and be a pediatrician when shewas growing up, but life got in
the way.
She ended up going the nursingroute and she's one of the best
people I know and she's the onewho got me interested in
medicine.
I remember being a little kidand going to work with her and
(14:50):
that's sort of where I got thebug.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
Dude, that's awesome.
I'm sure she's proud that she'sgot a son now.
I think so.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
But my mom's, one of the seven people that both my
parents actually and it's beengood for me.
But they're the type that theyintentionally make it to where
the bar to please them is high.
But there's a reason, there's amethod to the madness, because
if you to please my parents, yougotta do something exceptional.
(15:18):
And if you wanna make myparents happy and you aim for
something exceptional, you'regonna hit.
You're at least gonna get closeto that.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
That's pretty impressive.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Yeah, I mean.
So you wanna be under novel.
It goes for sports, mixedmartial arts.
Whatever you're doing, you justwanna be excellent.
You don't wanna be excellent inthe sense that you tell
everybody that you're excellent.
You just want the way youperform, just like your whole
essence, the way you set exampleby your actions.
You just want everybody just toknow that you're legit.
You don't have to tell peopleyou're legit.
(15:49):
People who I look at it thisway people who are tough, people
that know how to fight that'smy frame of reference here.
They don't go around and talkabout how they can beat people
up or how good they are atfighting.
They just are.
They don't talk about it.
I feel like it's the same wayin medicine or whatever.
You're good at.
People who are excellent,people that have put in the work
(16:09):
, people who are good at whatthey do, they don't have to talk
about it.
You just do it.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
That's exactly where I wanna be, where I'm standing
in the back, calm, when peoplestart to freak out, and then I
can just easily handle thesituation.
That's the beauty of we willget to do that plenty of times
in our career.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
And it's also one of those things you can't fake that
.
It's not something that you can,no matter how bad you wanna be
the chief, no matter how bad youwanna pad your resume, no
matter how bad you wanna be, thething you can't will that into
existence.
It's something that you earn byputting in the time.
It's not something that you canjust like go out and lobby for
that position, right.
You gain that experience andthat being calm in the center of
(16:49):
the storm by like being good atwhat you do.
And the way you're gonna becomegood at doing this is putting
in the time, doing the educationpart, doing the hands-on part,
spending a lot of time in theemergency room, not being afraid
to pick up the sickest patients, just getting there, getting
your hands dirty and doing thething.
That's what I love most aboutemergency medicine.
Like you, obviously you have tohave the clinical knowledge.
(17:11):
You have to know a little bitabout everything.
We have to be the second bestin every specialty in the
hospital, right?
Which is unique about ourspecialty, we have to know a
little bit about what everybodydoes.
Also, we deal withundifferentiated patients.
That's unique to what we do.
But there's also like ahands-on something you can't
teach aspect of emergencymedicine.
It's kind of just like yougotta be in the moment, take on
(17:33):
the beast as it comes.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
I love the fact that you said the time that it takes,
like he was making his wholepoint on how much time you spend
in the emergency department,because that's really what it is
Like the people that spend themost time you seeing the most
patients.
Those are always the rock stars,whether it's the nurse that's
been there for 20 years For sure, or it's the doc.
So you really gotta get inthere and get your hands dirty.
(17:56):
That's why I always love goinginto the ER for war when I was
in medical school and evenbefore, because half of the time
you got to do a little bit morethan you probably should be.
Speaker 2 (18:09):
I mean, it's one of those things that you gotta go
take what you want right.
Like you can sit there and sortof do the bare minimum and have
people say, oh hey, dr Adne,you need to go do this or you
need to go see that patient.
But if you really wanna be likeyou said, you wanna kind of
have the upper echelon, the wayyou get there is we're all gonna
be there the same amount oftime, like relatively, we all
(18:30):
have the same scheduleultimately, right.
But the way you sort ofseparate yourself from everybody
else would be while you'rethere, don't be afraid to just
pick up any patient, even ifit's something that you know
that you're not really good at,something that you're
uncomfortable with.
Just say, take the plunge.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
That's how you're gonna figure it out.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
You're gonna figure it out by seeing hundreds of
different presentations of thesame thing.
Everybody's a little bitdifferent.
The chaos is always a littlebit different.
There's all these littlefactors that change, but just
getting in the game is howyou're ultimately gonna become
better than the guy next to you.
It's just about being there andnot being afraid to just take
it on.
You gotta be willing to fail ifyou wanna get better at
(19:10):
something.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
Dude, that's the truth and I learned my best from
failure.
That's the one good thing.
I never guessed right the firsttime, but I always remember
when I fail and I won't make thesame mistake twice.
So I know that there was alittle mixup with the questions.
We were rudely interrupted.
I'm sorry, it's the problemwhen you have a wife.
(19:31):
Now I do have to answer toeveryone's call.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
We gotta be careful talking about the lines.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
Well, she knows.
Hopefully she'll be the oneediting this She'll hear it
twice.
So there was a moment, thoughyou were talking about your
mother was your inspiration.
She got you wanting to get intothe hospital early.
That's where you get your time,that's where you get your
mentality and, honestly, it'sthe strong women.
Like, in my family there's a lotof strong women and they're all
(20:00):
in medicine, and so it is funnybecause as a guy too, having a
little lady check you on yourmedical knowledge, you can come
in there real cocky in my houseand then you're gonna feel like
an idiot, leaving Absolutely man.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
I mean I really have enjoyed over the last decade or
so.
I remember when I was first inthe EMT paramedic realm, like
you, didn't really see as manywomen in the specialty, and over
the last decade two decadeswomen have really made a name
for themselves in emergencymedicine and I like to see it.
I think that women bring aunique aspect to it.
(20:36):
I think we all have certainthings that we're good at and I
think having an equal number ofwomen and men there together
just it's not gonna do anythingbut improve things Used to kind
of be a male dominated specialty.
But it's really not that wayanymore.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
No, which I mean that's gotta be a good thing,
because I mean, at the end ofthe day, women are kind of
leading us around anyway leavinga guy?
Yeah, absolutely, At some pointthat was why I had to answer
the call.
Sorry, guys, but this is anexciting month for you because
you've got the baby, you've gotthe micu.
(21:12):
So what?
How?
After the first couple of days,which you have all for whatever
, for the implantation, what isthe next couple of weeks like?
Look for Lindsay.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
Oh, okay, yes, great question.
So pretty much how it'll work.
So we're doing what's called anFET or a frozen embryo transfer
, meaning that once we wentthrough the initial half of the
process, which is I kind of lookat it as like the follicular
phase where you're trying tostimulate egg production, get a
good OO site, try to make goodembryos.
(21:47):
That's sort of the first half,and the second half is sort of
building up the endometriallining, kind of getting
everything ready for animplantation.
So I sort of looked at it astwo different steps and we're
obviously going to be on thesecond half.
So the implantation, assumingall the laboratory testing comes
back and the estrogenprogesterone levels look good
it'll take place on August 1stTuesday.
(22:09):
From there, implantation usuallytakes place one to five days
following that.
But you can't really reliablysay because of all the hormones,
it's sort of like convolutedthings.
So we will wait 10 to 14 daysto do a serum beta HCG which, if
that number comes back on 10 to14 days later it's 200 or
(22:33):
greater.
Then we can reliablycomfortably say that it took and
that we had a successfulimplantation.
That's sort of what we'relooking for.
So there's a lot of differentadvice out there.
It's one of those things wherethere's not a whole lot of
research on showing like what'sbetter post-transfer as far as
like these are the things thatyou need to do to increase
(22:54):
success, or these things havebeen shown to have a negative
correlation with success.
All I really know and from kindof diving into the literature,
obviously you don't want to runa marathon the next day.
You want to keep your stresslevels down, but honestly
there's a lot of stuff that saysyou don't want to just lay in
bed for the next two or threedays.
You kind of want to be up,moving around, you want to avoid
(23:17):
, like extreme temperatures.
That's one thing that'sconsistently pops up.
But hopefully just she'll beoff her feet for a couple of
days I'll sort of wait on herhand and foot and then she can
sort of ease back into herregular routine and come August
14th and hopefully we get thatpositive HCG and we can say that
we're pregnant and go fromthere.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Dude, I'm happy for you.
You should see the smile onthis man's face.
But the funny thing is, lindsaywas probably hoping that she
could at least get some bed restfrom the doctor.
Yeah, doctor's orders sheprobably needs to.
Speaker 2 (23:51):
She just wants a break.
She's a physician assistantworking in the emergency room.
So about my wife initially whenshe finished PA school she was
in general surgery for five, sixyears.
Love surgery Ended up just sortof needing a change, ended up
getting a job in the emergencyroom.
I'm going to de facto takecredit for sort of helping
(24:12):
influence that decision.
She may deny that but I like tothink that I influenced her to
make that change.
She really enjoys the emergencyroom as a mid-level.
Pas are a relatively new thinghere in Mississippi.
There's a big nursepractitioner scene here in
Mississippi but the PA thing wasrelatively new.
So she kind of was on thecutting edge of how are we going
(24:32):
to use physician assistants inthe emergency medicine setting?
in Mississippi, I know it's verycommon in other states, but in
Mississippi PAs in the ER are avery new thing and my wife is
sort of like on the cutting edgeor the front lines of how that
was going to work.
So she mainly does a lot oftriage, which is not her
favorite thing, but then shealso does Probably an equal
(24:54):
number of rapid track shifts.
She also works back in the whatwe call pods with the
attendings Just in the mainadult ED, and she loves it.
She's learned a lot and it'ssomething that we both are able
to talk about, but it isstressful.
It's not really one of the best, most conducive things for
going through a featurefertilization cycle, and that's
(25:15):
not my opinion.
That was one thing that myposition harped on.
He was always like y'all haveway too much stress, so I need
to cut it down, you don't needto tone it back, but at the end
of the day, how are we gonna dothat?
I can't just stop working.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Yeah, you just gave it work.
Did you give him the speechabout rising to the top?
Yeah, why?
That would have been a change.
We're in it now, man.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
We got to keep going forward and we'll figure out a
way to make it work.
And one thing about both mywife and I's we always take the
the difficult path to get places, so we were happy to take on
the challenge.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
That's good.
I'm excited I at least get tosee you for the next three years
before you leave us.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
Yeah, you can have the babysit for me a little bit.
That's fine, I got a goodbabysitter.
Speaker 1 (25:55):
She also edits this podcast.
A lady of many traits, butthat's exciting.
Yes, cheers to you too as well.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
Cheers my friend too, yes, sir.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
Being done with opium .
Speaker 2 (26:08):
So let me ask you a question, and again, this is
something that, if you don'twant to go down this road, we
definitely don't have to.
But are you and Mary best?
Do y'all want to have children?
Is that something y'all haveconsidered or thought about?
Speaker 1 (26:20):
So yeah, we definitely considered it, but at
this time we're not likeparticularly trying.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
I think it's definitely going to happen.
It's kind of what I've beentelling you about how we didn't
need to see any strays Becausewe'll eventually end up with a
right, right, right.
I feel like that's supposed tohappen.
Now.
That is only because that's howmost of the children in my
family are.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
They're coming about.
Speaker 1 (26:42):
Oops, we have a kid down there.
So I'm kind of hoping for that.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
I definitely want them, but Right now, I guess in
full transparency, I think shehas an IUD, so if she got
pregnant that would be a medicalemergency.
Yeah, that'd be a problem.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
Yeah, but yeah.
So not trying right now, but Iassume, like in the future,
maybe a little bit more stable.
Yeah, I mean ultimately, Iguess what I was asking you is
you want to be as being a dad?
Something that you kind of grewup thinking that that's what
you wanted, yeah definitely,definitely, wanted to be a dad,
which, so I mean, I come from apretty big family to begin with.
(27:18):
So I always wanted like atleast a couple, because I know
kids are also like all a littledifferent.
Yeah sometimes that's like thecute thing about it.
Yeah, for sure, man, you know,you never know what you're gonna
get.
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
And I grew up with a.
I have a fraternal twin brother.
His name's Chris.
He's a geotechnical engineer,very boring, and Outside of
Atlanta.
He lives in a town calledMarietta.
But when you have a twingrowing up, you always have a
person.
There's always somebody likenot only did we share a womb
upon intended, but also like wekind of went through the same
(27:52):
stages of life together at theexact same time.
So you know, having siblingswas something that, in my mind,
was indispensable with like theway my life played out going
forward.
My wife is Sort of an onlychild.
She grew up with half siblings,but she doesn't have an actual
full-blood sibling of her own,and that's something she always
talks about, especially when westarted talking about having
(28:14):
kids.
Is she definitely wants to?
If we're fortunate enough tohave a baby, we would love to
have to, but especially aftereverything that we've went
through, one is plenty, but I dothink that Growing up in life
with a sibling is something Iwould like for my future kid to
maybe experience it for four.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
Yeah yeah Well, dude, you never know like we I think
we had even talked about thistoo sometimes, especially when
it's just happenstance that it'snot taking whenever one baby
comes, another one.
So yeah, yeah you may end upwith more than you want, but
that is a very, very excitingmoment for you.
(28:53):
I'm yeah, it's gonna be, it'sgonna be great.
At least she'll be able to havesome bed rest and you won't
even know about it becauseyou'll be at the make, you, yeah
exactly.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
And then one of the things the older I get, I sort
of have one thing that sort ofconsistently ends up being true
that you realize when you getolder is that the the times in
life, when you are dealtsomething or encounter something
that you were not expecting,like a unexpected difficulty in
your life.
Though, in overcoming thosethings, those are the things
(29:22):
that end up being the mostmeaningful to you.
So don't be afraid of taking achallenge.
You know, being a parent isdefinitely a challenge, like a
lot of people, especiallymedical people, when they're
going through school andtraining they're.
I can't have a kid, I'm inmedical school.
I can't have a kid.
I'm going through residency andI keep just kicking that can
down the road, but I'm just hereto tell you that you can do
(29:42):
more than you think you can.
If, if a dumb meathead fromMadison, mississippi, can uh,
you know get in to an ERresidency and potentially become
an ER doctor, then you can dodo more than you realize?
Speaker 1 (29:54):
No, dude, technically you are an ER doctor, so don't.
Speaker 2 (29:57):
Yeah, that's right, I am an ER doctor, I'm still
getting comfortable with that,right?
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Yeah, you're your name sounds so similar to my
last name that I now startthinking that even when you
introduce yourself that you'rereferring to me.
So when people are calling fordr Abdeen, I'm gonna be so
confused.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Yeah, abney abdeen, I didn't really think about that,
but yeah, it does, it does kindof it does get confusing.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
So that's fun because I've actually never met
somebody that had such a similar.
There's been people that havehad Very few people have a last
name where they're above me onthe list right.
So just to that dude.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
ABD, abd.
I mean the only people who beatme, or the AA ronds, for all
you key and pill fans out there.
Speaker 1 (30:40):
Yeah, the, so oh shoot.
What was I got to say?
There was, uh, I don't know,man, I can't read your mind, I
know.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
Oh well, I can interject here.
One question I have for you iswhat is something that you are
most, whether it be like aspecific skill or a particular
rotation, or maybe it's just thewhole thing globally?
What are you most lookingforward to, or what do you want
to get out of your intern yearmore than anything else?
Speaker 1 (31:08):
Ooh, that's a good question.
I would have to say that theone thing that I want to get out
from the intern year Is that Iwant to get really good at like
procedures and making sure thatI know, skill-wise, what I'm
doing.
Yeah, yeah, I know that somethings are going to still slip
my mind and stuff like that, butI want to get the hands-on
(31:30):
experience over and over andover again.
Now, that makes sense and if Ican at least get that down, I
feel like I might be worth adamn in the future.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, there's a huge learningcurve and, like Rome wasn't
built in a day, you can't do itall in a year, but that seems
like a good goal to me, beingthere personally.
Speaker 1 (31:48):
after a year, what is your goal?
Speaker 2 (31:50):
for me, I guess the biggest my.
I sort of have like a very I'mvery goal oriented.
I have to have very specificgoals.
It's just something I need tokind of move myself forward.
So for this year I want to getto where I can reliably that's
the key word reliably See atleast one patient per hour.
Reliably, um, so if you takethe average over the time and
(32:13):
I'm working in the yard, if Ican, as an intern, reliably see
a patient an hour every time Iwork, uh, or get to that point
by the end of the year, I willconsider that a success and
anything above that or beyond.
That would be fantastic.
But at least one patient perhour, that's a goal.
Another goal of mine is just tokind of there.
One of the big things you haveto make the transition from
(32:34):
medical school to Actually beinga doctor is your decisions
actually carry a little bit moreweight, kind of getting a
little more comfortable in therole as far as like knowing why
I'm doing something.
So in the past, where it's likeyou're doing medical questions
or board questions, you say oh,the answer is this we're doing
this because you remember abuzzword.
I want to be able to always sayI'm ordering this test Because
(32:58):
this, or we need to do thisprocedure because why?
Like actually understanding theins and outs of exactly why I'm
doing something, exactly when Ineed to do something?
That's also very important tome, so actually kind of learning
the details that you didn'treally or weren't expected to
know as a medical student.
Plus, see a patient an hourthat's my goal.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
Yeah, that that patient an hour is good, that's
good workflow.
Yeah, do you think that yourgoal oriented like scheduling,
like where you're you're goingby goal by goal is because of
the Fighting background that youessentially was it?
Speaker 2 (33:29):
did it start there like work?
Speaker 1 (33:31):
because for sure you were in high school, when you
were Fighting right when youcame out.
Yeah, so were you goal orientedeven back then?
Speaker 2 (33:39):
always I have to have .
I'm just the type of personthat I have to have A very
specific set of objectives thatI'm trying to meet.
Otherwise it's very hard todirect my energy and focus Into
like a productive matter ifyou're trying to focus on
everything then it's verydifficult to focus on anything.
(33:59):
If that makes sense, you sort ofhave to pick some short-term
goals, like you obviously wantto have a long-term goal, like
Eventually, I want to be anattending your physician who can
handle whatever comes throughthe door, but in order to get
there you got to take some babysteps along the way, right, and
it's important to kind of keepthose objectives in your mind
because ultimately we become thethings that we do and the
(34:21):
things that we think about.
So if you consistently tellyourself, my goal for this
rotation or my goal for thisyear is to meet this objective,
just by virtue of setting thatwhether you write it down,
whether you just like set itfirmly in your mind Setting that
goal Is going to make you morelikely to actually accomplish
that goal, if that makes sense.
(34:41):
It's a little woo-woo, but itdoes work.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
No, if you need a, if you need a pep up, that means
for anybody listen.
If you need a good pep talk,this guy's want to go to.
He'll get you in your head.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
Yeah, man, I mean you were an athlete growing up too,
so I mean I know you did thisto some degree like you played
football.
Right, yeah, what position didyou play in football?
I played defensive in.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
You're defensive, yeah, and I played tight in like
a little bit in college andthen I also oh cool, I didn't
make a good college football,that's the cooler man.
So think about when you weredoing that right, like when
you're in the offseason.
You.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Whether you actually like thought about it
consciously or not, you did havelittle small goals that you
were trying to meet toeventually get you to.
Whatever your end goal was,whether it be I want to start on
the college team or I want todo x, y, z, whatever it is you
have to take steps along the way.
It's just something that,especially in mixed martial arts
because the way I like to thinkabout it is similar to
(35:36):
emergency medicine in that theyboth of those things involve
high level problem solving withdire consequences for failure.
Right, and whenever you'regoing to be engaged in activity
like that, that has a lot of youhave to have a lot of skin in
the game doing something likethat.
And in order to get yourself toa place to where you can
comfortably take on thatchallenge, you got to start
(35:57):
small.
You got to say I can relateeverything back to martial arts,
like, okay, I want to make surethat my boxing is good.
My goal for this month is towork on my boxing, get to where
I can do three, three minuterounds just with the boxing
gloves.
On next month, I want to workon my jiu jitsu.
I want to get it to whatevermetric.
I'm trying to meet same withwrestling and that way, when you
(36:19):
have a fight, and in may fightin the distance, I can say I met
this objective of my wrestling,this objective with my boxing
this with my kickboxing and thenthat way if I knew I met
objective A, b and C, then myglobal objective of not getting
my ass kicked in the fight isgoing to be more likely to be
met if I can say that I did this, this and this, as opposed to
(36:41):
just my goal going in, beinglike I'm just gonna, I'm just
gonna get good.
Like what does that mean right?
for me and again like you, maybe a superhuman I'm not, but I
have to directly focus on whatI'm trying to accomplish in
order to like make that progress, and for me it takes making a
list of, like I want to do this,this and this.
(37:03):
I know I've kind of harped on abunch of times, but it's super
important dude, I love it.
Speaker 1 (37:07):
Yeah, corey has one of the best like the icebreaker
question answers when they say,hey, go around the room and just
tell us something unique aboutyourself.
And then Corey's like, yeah, myprofessional fighting career
record is, you know, and it'ssomething that you, you've got a
solid record, it's something inthe 20.
Speaker 2 (37:25):
I don't even like the sort of number on it, man, it's
even hard to quantify it.
Speaker 1 (37:29):
We're jumping right back in, we had some technical
issues.
This is the first time thatthis, our new studio, has been
in use.
In the Jackson studio we stillgot some things to by taking
real difficulties.
Speaker 2 (37:41):
He means that I clumsily knocked the microphone
off of the stand, so this is hisfirst time, you're really yes
hey, you're doing great to startoff with and I mean my
difficulties.
Speaker 1 (37:54):
You should have seen us.
When we first started I had Icould not figure out the mic
stuff at all one of the mics.
One time we did multiple oneswhere only one mic was working.
Oh, I can only imagine.
And then it took me towards theend of the whole thing to
figure out that there was anissue yeah, I'm a big podcast
fan.
Speaker 2 (38:13):
Like you know sounds cliche, I guess some people will
probably make fun of me forthis, but I'm a big Joe Rogan
podcast listener.
Like Shane Gillis, I like allthe comedian podcasts I'm super
into, have grown up listening tohim and sort of like my I've
always had this like desire towant to do a podcast.
In fact, my brother and Ialways talk about, oh, we should
(38:33):
do one, we should do one, and Ialways hear a lot of people say
that.
But it's definitely somethingthat I think a lot of people out
there think that, oh, you justsit down and you talk.
It's a lot more complicatedthan that.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
It's certainly it's just a different type, but
sometimes you can especially onlonger ones, like you can
actually get to a point whereyou're just vibing or you're
just talking, and that'ssometimes when you get the best
out of the conversation, andit's really just you were saying
it right before we sat down.
Back down is that we can me andthis guy, we hit it off early
(39:03):
because we could just talk aboutanything for like a long time,
and so it really sometimes itjust works out, but it
definitely is a different, likeskill yeah like I should my own
voice.
So having to hear my own voice,oh yeah, on top of that.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
I definitely don't like it's.
I don't like seeing myself avideo, I don't like hearing my
voice and recording.
But I'm sure I'm not alone inthat.
But I do like you, so I liketalking to you.
No problem, this is easy sickit is.
Speaker 1 (39:27):
Uh, the feeling is mutual and honestly I feel like,
for your first time, and it'sgoing good, it's gonna do.
I mean, this is his first timecoming out as a doctor, so
you're gonna be literally rightthere on the floor and it's
gonna be it's gonna be anexciting month.
I do.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
I'm so excited.
I mean, I'd be lying if Ididn't admit that I am nervous,
but more than I am nervous, I'mexcited.
I'm excited to finally.
This has been like a big, longprocess in the making for me.
This is something I've wantedto do for a long time.
A lot of people, you know theyget to get in the game early.
They're.
They start when they're 22.
(40:03):
They start residency whenthey're still in their 20s.
I'm 35 years old, so you know,at least in my medical school
class I used to always joke thatI was the class dad.
Speaker 1 (40:12):
Oh, he is now too.
He's a.
We've literally been talking.
Yeah well, I don't even meanit's about to be the dad.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
I don't even mean it in like that, since I just meant
that I was the oldest one in mymedical school class by like
significantly, um, but that'snot the case in my residency
class.
I'll say our residency.
Our group of interns isactually a very cool, unique,
diverse group.
We have people of all differentages, all different backgrounds
.
I know it sounds cliche to saythat, oh, I love my co-interns
(40:41):
and co-residents, but we do havea really, really good group in
addition to our upper levels.
They're all very cool peopletoo, yeah.
Speaker 1 (40:47):
I you're not the oldest, aren't you?
Yeah, not at all there's.
I'm not naming names, I'm nottrying to out anybody's age, but
yeah, you know who you are,definitely not the oldest one,
which is uh, which is differentfor me that was something that
that for me.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
At the beginning, especially in medical school, I
was very self-conscious aboutmm-hmm.
I don't really even think aboutit anymore, but when I started
medical school at William Carey,I had not been in a classroom
in probably nine years, so thatwas a very huge adjustment, in
addition to having to commute 90miles every day because I was
living here and the school Iwent to was in a different city.
(41:23):
So but I mean, like again, I'mpreaching to the choir you, you
moved to an island and youtraveled all over the country
and we do what we got to do toaccomplish the things we want to
do.
Speaker 1 (41:33):
Dang right the good thing about medical school, too,
is there is older people too.
That I noticed, like even in mymedical school, there was
always like an older person too,which is awesome.
You got to do what you got todo.
You had a whole life.
We were talking about it beforethe whole uh mic incident.
But I mean, this guy, how long,how long did you fight for?
Speaker 2 (41:53):
long time.
I mean I started doing um.
I mean, if I was to go all theway back, I started doing
martial arts when I was probablyfour or five years old.
But I started doing Brazilianjujitsu and really getting into
the mixed martial arts realm ofit when I was 13 years old.
I did that all the way throughmy, you know, mid to late 20s.
Some of that time I was doingamateur mixed martial arts,
(42:14):
professional mixed martial arts.
A lot of Brazilian Jiu Jitsutournaments Me and some of my
buddies we competed on anational level with Jiu Jitsu
went all over the country.
A really good friend of mine andtraining partner of mine
competed in.
The two of them actuallycompeted in the Abu Dhabi trials
, which if you're a Jiu Jitsunerd out there, you'll know what
I'm talking about.
We went to the East Coasttrials and that's something that
(42:36):
I got to do at a very highlevel and it was a very
important and impactful thing inmy life.
It's a unique thing.
It definitely made me theperson that I am and then also
kind of just having thatexperience of getting to live a
whole another life before goingto med school I think ultimately
makes me a better doctor, andwhat I mean by that specifically
(42:59):
is that I feel like I'm moreable to relate to the common
person as opposed to like justnot saying anything negative
about my colleagues that weresmart enough and disciplined
enough to like go all the waythrough.
That's also super impressive,but sometimes I feel like the
non-traditional students get abad rap sometimes.
(43:21):
But I feel like DO schools andthe Caribbean schools do a good
job of giving us a shot and I'mbiased, but I think we make
pretty good doctors.
Speaker 1 (43:31):
Yeah, some would say the best doctors.
Speaker 2 (43:34):
Hey, you said that.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
No, dude For one, probably the best doctors, but
we won't make claims.
Yeah, but that whole lifebefore that had to be so.
Yeah, that just makes you a lotmore unique.
And the best thing is when hesaid his record in front of the
program director and everythingour program director was like
yeah, I'm pretty sure he's ablack belt.
(43:56):
Nobody should mess with Corey.
Yeah, because you're a blackbelt, right?
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (44:00):
yeah, I've got a black belt and a few different
things.
I've just been doing martialarts my whole life and I do
recommend anybody out therelistening that has ever wanted
to try it, whether even ifyou're an adult and feel like,
oh, I'm too old to start, at thevery least I recommend
everybody out here listening goout and start or at least do
some amount or some classes ofBrazilian Jiu-Jitsu, just for
(44:21):
self-defense purposes.
I think that you will.
It's a great exercise.
Find a good gym, you won't gethurt doing it and it's also very
practical.
It's sort of designed for asmaller, like not necessarily
professional fighter person tobe able to take on a much bigger
, much more even skilledopponent as far as like somebody
(44:42):
who may be a kickboxer, but ifyou know the ground game, it's
something that you can at leastgive yourself a fighting chance.
I recommend that for women,self-defense and guys out there,
go do it.
Speaker 1 (44:53):
I mean, I definitely need to start.
I think we're going to startoff with some little foxy boxing
.
Yeah, we should we definitelyshould, man, I was just, but I
definitely am going to have tocome and learn from you, or at
least let you choke me out onceor twice.
Speaker 2 (45:08):
I can do that, and since we're talking about that I
want to give a shout out to ifyou're here in Jackson
Mississippi, go check out noLimit Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and
MMA under Jarrett Beck's,randall Powell, johnny Little
and all his guys.
Those are the big guys here inJackson to go learn from Very
cool people.
You will learn a lot.
(45:28):
I decided to put that plug inoh, you got to dude.
Speaker 1 (45:31):
and this guy trust me when your program director is
working.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
Anthony Mitchell, clayton Pitts them also.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
So the one thing about your previous career he
has one of the best photos ofhimself that will talk pretty
much to anybody else's in theirhouse where he's pummeling a
guy's face and it's just like Ithink it was your debut or
whatever, in the USC orsomething like that.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
It was a fight in Little Rock, Arkansas.
Back in I think it was 2009 or10, that picture you're talking
about Pretty cool.
That was when I was young andhad a bunch of just ripped up
muscles.
I had youth on my side then, soit's a cool picture to have
hanging in your house.
Speaker 1 (46:10):
Oh yeah, certainly I'm working on getting one of
those for myself.
Okay, so first you were afighter and then switched to
paramedics.
What was the transition like?
Did you injure yourself andthen?
Speaker 2 (46:25):
No, it wasn't even that.
It was just one of those thingsthat I knew when I was a little
kid.
I used to always say I wantedto be a doctor.
I'm not one of those peoplewho's going to say I wanted to
be a doctor since I was fiveyears old, because nobody really
knows what they want to do whenthey're five.
But from when I was old enoughto kind of be cognizant of the
world around me 12, 13, I knewthat I wanted to be a doctor.
(46:46):
It was just a matter of if Ibelieved in myself to do it.
What was it going to take toget there?
I also really loved martial arts.
That's like my other second bigpassion in life.
I just knew that I wasn't goingto do it for a career.
And as far as you can trainyour entire life, you can go be
part of a jiu-jitsu club or akickboxing club for your whole
life.
(47:06):
It's very good exercise andit's that.
But if you're going to compete,particularly in the mixed
martial arts aspect of it, it'ssomething that you need to at
least be able to say to yourselfI'm all in, because if you're
not all in, you're probablygoing to fight somebody who's
all in, particularly when youstart getting to the higher
levels of it.
You don't want to lock yourselfinto a cage with another man.
(47:26):
If you're not all in and he'sin there fighting for his family
, you're going to lose.
I just knew it wasn't going tobe my career and so I just
decided you got to know when tohang it up and start focusing on
the school and things like that.
Speaker 1 (47:40):
That's the exact same thing that happened with me for
football.
There was a moment in collegewhere I realized that I wasn't
going to do anything with thisand then it felt I don't know.
It all faded from what it wasBecause it used to be war.
Oh, when your testosterone ishigh, everything is a perceived.
You get your band of brothersand you go to war, and so I just
(48:05):
it.
Eventually, you just startmaking goals in a different
direction.
Speaker 2 (48:07):
Right.
One good thing, though, is oneof the things I miss the most
when I kind of stepped away fromfull time doing martial arts,
doing mixed martial arts, youdid see was that camaraderie,
that team aspect, and that's oneof the reasons I was drawn to
emergency medicine.
It's one of those medicalspecialties where I really do
feel like there is a verypalpable team aspect of it.
(48:31):
It's very similar to being partof like a martial arts gym.
We're all going through a lotof hardcore things, seeing a lot
of hardcore things, puttingourselves in vulnerable
situations.
We're all doing it together,and you can't do it by yourself.
It requires like a whole teamof people to be able to get the
job done.
So emergency medicine kind ofreally did help to fill that
(48:51):
void.
So that is one reason I kind ofwas drawn to the specialty.
In addition to that, just asfar as going back to my
background, the transition onceI sort of got out of competitive
martial arts was my undergraddegree is in biochemistry from
the University of Mississippi,ole Miss, hotty, toddy, hotty,
toddy.
Speaker 1 (49:12):
Yeah, we're the rebels.
Now, dude, yeah, the rebels,that's right.
Speaker 2 (49:15):
But I used my degree.
My dad and I actually got apatent for wastewater treatment
for chicken plants here inMississippi.
So we sort of came up with aprocess patent, which a process
patent is not just like onespecific thing you get a patent
on, it's the entirety of theprocess.
So we had a micro screen thatwe added chemical separation to.
(49:39):
Sort of all the things togetherwas our own unique process.
Really, it all started because alocal chicken plant in Canton,
mississippi, was kind of ranafoul of the Mississippi
Department of EnvironmentalQuality regulations for like
what levels of bacteria andoxygen demand and all these
things of the water itself, andthey were getting fined
(50:03):
thousands and thousands, tens ofthousands dollars a day.
And my dad is an attorney.
He had a relationship with himthat way and then sort of
segwayed into maybe we can helpyou fix this problem, and with
myself with my degree inbiochemistry, my brother who's
an engineer, my dad, who's anattorney but also just one of
the smartest people we've evermet, we all kind of banded
together and sort of came upwith a solution to this problem
(50:26):
and implemented it.
And that was a very cool partof my journey through this life,
too, was getting to work withmy dad and that.
So taking that step and thenrealizing I need to probably
start doing some more medicalthings, and took the EMT route
and worked as a patienttransporter at St Dominic's and
I've done it all.
Speaker 1 (50:47):
Hey All White Co listeners.
I hate to cut it short, but meand Corey talked for so long
that I had to split up into twoepisodes, so follow us along
next week for the second part ofthis episode.
Thank you again for everybodythat listens.
We appreciate you and good luckto everybody that's going
through the match process rightnow.
We'll see you next week.
Hello everybody and welcome to the Off-White Coat
podcast.
I'm your host, jordan Amney,and today we got a big one.
This man has worn many hats hewas a paramedic, an MMA fighter
and is now the new ER physicianat the University of Mississippi
Medical Center.
I would like to welcome myfriend, my co-resident, dr Corey
Abdeen.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Just finished our orientation month for emergency
medicine residency they call itOPM at the University of
Mississippi Medical Center inJackson, Probably one of the
better places in the country todo an EM residency.
I'm from here.
I grew up in Jackson.
Hold on hold on.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
This man is amazing, guys, I want to let you know.
So I did do your intro, butthen I was just seeing if I
could get the mic.
I was just trying to get themic perfectly in front of his
face.
I asked him to start talking.
He essentially starts the show.
Great way to start it.
He gave us the full background.
I follow instructions well, he'sgoing to be a good one.
(01:08):
So this is my friend and nowco-resident, dr Corey Abdeen.
As he said, we had justfinished OPM, which is the
training month for the emergencyresidents.
We got a full month of where weessentially did a bunch of
simulations.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Yeah, we kind of learned a little bit of what
we're doing before they send usoff to the wolves.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Yeah, you officially got your training wheels taken
off.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
You're going to start in the emergency room right,
Yep.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
And then this guy, he has the rough schedule, the
rough schedule in the medicalICU.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
I think you get four days off for the month and I'm
trying to have a baby in themiddle of all that.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
It's going to be a wild month.
We've got a lot to break downbecause you have a lot of
exciting things starting.
You've got the license to kill,you're about to be up in the
mic you Exactly, and he is aboutto be a father.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Well, we're willing, man.
Hopefully it'll work out.
We're doing a embryo transfer,secondary to having done IVF, so
we're both very excited aboutit.
We already know it'spotentially going to be a little
boy, so Wait, wait, wait.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Oh so y'all made the decision.
They had a coin flip, Yep.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Well, we had a boy and a girl embryo.
We knew that going in becausewe did gene testing and our
physician, our doctor, told usthat the highest grade embryo,
sort of a subjective scoringsystem.
They used to sort of say, oh,this embryo is higher quality
than the other one.
He wanted the higher qualityembryo, which is so happened to
be the boy, which I'm not sadabout.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
Yeah, he's like yeah, I knew my boy would be the
better quality embryo.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
I mean, I feel like every man to some degree, if you
want kids has a dream of havinga son when they pass it on the
lineage.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
Dude, that's exciting and that's literally happening
this week, so I bet your nerveshave got to be up in the air.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
I'm very nervous.
I'm nervous because I want itto happen.
I'm also nervous because Ireally want it to work out for
my wife Infertility if anybodyever has to go through it, it's
a rough thing, particularly withyour wife person.
You love having to watch themgo through.
That's not an easy thing.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
Yeah, I mean, it can be just totally random.
It happens on Tuesday, rightyeah?
Speaker 2 (03:15):
She has to go back for another round of blood tests
to check her estrogen andprogesterone levels.
I mean, it gets real trickywith the timing and the hormone
levels have to be just right.
There's a window forimplantation.
We could spend the wholepodcast just talking about IVF.
I've sort of become a de factoexpert, yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
We did the transvaginal ultrasounds.
Corey was a pro.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Oh yeah, oh yeah, he's like.
I've seen you before.
There's a lot of them.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
It's awesome, though, because you had mentioned and
that was what I was going to sayis that when they checked both
of you, there was nothing goingon.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
Yeah, so we had what they call unexplained or no
diagnosis infertility.
So she didn't really have anyobvious issues, no problems with
the uterus.
She was effectively making eggs.
My sperm count was normal.
There's really no indication asto why we've had trouble, which
is actually more common thanyou would think.
In fact don't necessarily get adiagnosis.
(04:12):
So it kind of makes it tough,though, because it's better to
have answers sometimes, becausesometimes having an answer makes
it at least make a little moresense.
But in this case you're goingthrough the IVF process.
If there's a step that youcouldn't really identify as a
problem, it will kind of come tolight during an IVF process.
But you sort of have to gothrough every step, make the
(04:34):
embryo, everything has to goright on that end, all the
things.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
Yeah, they told you you were old and everything yeah
we're both geriatric in thepregnancy world being over 35.
That's exciting.
So you were giving herinjections.
I mean it's got to be goodhaving a husband that's in
healthcare, that can.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
I guess.
So I guess it was helpful thatat least I've used needles
before and at least given somemeds before.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Yeah, Corey has actually been one of the main
sources, like a pillar thatwe've leaned on heavy during
OPIM, because he was in medicinefor many years, even before
medical school.
Because you were a paramedic,yeah, yeah, and then he was
putting people in ambulancesright before that.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Yeah.
Yeah, my pathway to medicalschool was sort of a long,
convoluted one, but yeah, Istarted out kind of doing a
little professional mixedmartial arts, kind of rounded
back to doing some paramedictraining, emt training.
I was new, I wanted to go tomedical school, but when I was
younger didn't really think itwas for me.
Or really not that it wasn'tfor me, I just didn't think that
(05:40):
I was smart enough to do it.
I guess I proved myself wrong.
Here we are.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Yeah, we'll let Corey be the leader for this one.
It's a baby where like, hmm,course, probably needs to leave.
Speaker 2 (05:54):
Yeah, it's, uh, it's been a fun journey, though I
mean.
I kind of I kind of look at yoursituation is similar to mine in
the sense that the path you hadto take to get here is very
admirable, took a lot of work,you had to do a lot of things
that a lot of people didn't haveto do, so more is having to do
all the traveling you did andhit a little on an island.
I have a lot of respect forthat man.
(06:14):
I like you a lot, I likeeverybody in our class a lot,
but I expect big things from you, man.
I think you're going to dogreat Big expectations.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
I love those.
Yeah, no, I want to take Iwouldn't change it for anything
in the world.
The hardships kind of make youand so sometimes when you put
yourself in uncomfortablesituations, you kind of rise
Absolutely, you raise the bar alittle bit and so I'm excited.
We got a great group ofco-residents.
Corey, you're probably actuallylike my first friend, because
(06:44):
we met during like the interviewday and we did like the tour
together.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Yeah, that's right.
That's right.
Yeah, we met.
We both had the same interviewday.
I had just finished an auditionrotation, or sub-eye, whatever
you want to call it.
I think the last day of mysub-eye was my interview and
that was also the day that I metyou.
I even remember telling you Iwas like you're going to get in,
we're both going to end up here, I'll see you in a few months.
Yeah, not to be on horn, but Iwas right.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
He really was.
He knew everybody there and hesaid the magic words to me where
he was like trust me.
So first off, I see him shakinghands with everybody, so I
already know that he knows atleast the day-to-day operations
at this place.
And then he looks at me andhe's like you're going to see
some shit, oh yeah.
But at the end of it you'regoing to have the best training
(07:32):
he's like and I know you'll getin.
And I was like I have morefaith in you than myself.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
He knows this, he knows the process, and look at
us now.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
Yeah, look where you ended up.
And yeah, going back to sort ofwhat you were saying a second
ago about Jackson Mississippi, Istill stand by that.
One of the unique things aboutdoing medicine here in
Mississippi is we sort of have alot of distinctions that are
not necessarily the best ones.
We're the least healthy state.
We have the highest infantmortality rate.
We've got the sickest people.
(08:03):
Jackson Mississippi also, Ithink, currently is the second
or third highest murder percapita in the country.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
I think they said that it was the third homicide
rate.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
It's a lot.
There's a lot of gun violence,a lot of penetrating trauma,
also a lot of very acute medicalcases where it's not just heart
failure.
It's people have multiplechronic conditions on top of
whatever exacerbation they'rehaving that leads them into the
emergency room.
So you're kind of doing medicineat a super high level.
You're having to think you'renot just fixing one problem,
(08:34):
you're always, at the very least, fixing a problem on top of
several other problems.
So things kind of get tricky.
Like I said, we talked aboutearlier a lot of gun violence,
which is never fun, a lot ofpediatric trauma.
That's never fun to deal witheither, but as an emergency
medicine doctor, you need to beable to take care of it all, and
Jackson provides that.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
Yeah, when I heard it and I saw it in full effect, it
was quite impressive, like justthe campus in general.
I couldn't say no.
So that's I mean, you're aMississippi man too, so he's the
person to actually get yourinformation from.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Yeah it's.
I grew up here, been here bypretty much my entire life, went
to undergrad up in NorthMississippi, spent most of my
time in Jackson.
Now I'm back in Jackson, met mywife here.
She's a transplant fromPensacola, florida.
She went to the PA program.
That's in Clinton, mississippi,right side of Jackson.
So yeah, my wife and I arepretty much all in on medicine.
(09:29):
My mom is in the yard nurse atBaptist hospital, which is
another thing.
It's a level three traumacenter down the street from UMC.
My wife works at anotherhospital, st Dominic's, which is
right next door to UMC, whichis a level two, maybe three,
trauma center.
So yeah, my life pretty muchrevolves around emergency
medicine.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
So I'm excited about kind of getting to finally be
not to get confused with theyeah, dude, you're about to be a
lot of transplants that makeyou a lot of transplants going
on today, but that's the themeof this week, this upcoming week
.
That's right Now.
I did want you've got a toughschedule to start off with, so
they eased us in the first roundin the ER.
(10:10):
Corey, on the other hand, hashis first away rotation and, if
you're not familiar with it,usually in all three years of
your residency you're you'regoing through rotations where
you're not just in the ER.
If you're in emergency positionor anesthesia, they're not
always doing that You're indifferent parts of the hospital,
and so Corey is going to theMiki, which is the medical ICU
(10:31):
where the sick adults go.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
Yeah, so all those sick DKA patients, heart failure
, all the sick people you see inthe emergency room a lot of
them end up in the Miki.
So you know if you're in theMiki by virtue of that, that
you're probably not doing well.
I'm excited about it.
It's one of the rotations thatinitially, when I found out
that's where I was starting,kind of made me a little nervous
, because I was.
I kind of looked at everybodyelse's schedule.
(10:54):
Everybody else at least has oneother person for more class
with them at the same time.
I'm all by my lonesome as faras I don't have any other
interns with me on this rotation.
I also haven't really done aformal critical care rotation.
I didn't do that in medicalschool.
So that all makes me a littlenervous.
But I know I'm going to learn alot.
(11:16):
The schedule is pretty brutal 12hour shifts.
It's either 6A to 6P or 6B to6A.
You got to get there 30 minutesearly for sign out and you work
.
I think out of a 30 day monthI'm going to work 26 days.
So pretty much, if you want tofind me in the month of August,
come to the Miki at theUniversity of Mississippi
Medical Center and I'll be there.
But I'm kind of hoping that atthe very least I'll get to do a
(11:39):
lot of procedures and I'll learna little bit about vent
management.
I'm not going to touch the ventthat's apparently a rule at UMC
we don't touch it but it'sgoing to be a good opportunity
to learn a lot of things.
So hopefully my next rotationwill be in the emergency room.
So hopefully this month willkind of get me schooled up and
ready to go.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
This is going to be great and you're going to get so
much practice with all thoseprocedures.
Yeah, you don't want to govisit Cory in this next month
Because he's going to be with abunch of very sick people, but I
think you're going to get a tonof experience and even if you
didn't have that formal one likethe learning curve, when you
get thrown into a job whereyou're not sure what's going on
(12:16):
like, you'll start picking upthings and it might just, you
know, like we were just talkingabout, like sometimes, those
hard parts really like boostyour level.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
Absolutely.
It's kind of like gettingthrown into the deep end of a
pool to learn how to swim.
I mean, you're either going tofigure it out or you're going to
just sink to the bottom andfail miserably and I try not to
fail things miserably, at least.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
We believe in baptizing by fire here in
Mississippi.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
I mean we did pick emergency medicine right.
They're definitely easier pass.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
Yeah, but I wouldn't take it any other way.
I love a little chaos.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
I mean, yeah, I kind of think going on that I mean
I'm going to interview theinterviewer.
I think it's really cool thatyour mother is an emergency
medicine physician.
Correct me if I'm wrong, butI'm sure that had some impact on
your decision to pursue thisspecialty.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Yeah, my mom is definitely.
My family in general had a hugeimpact on me wanting to go into
medicine.
That was like all I would hear.
They would come back, be at thekitchen table, we'd be having
dinner and they would just talkabout either somebody sick over
here in the cardiac floor, andmy mom always had like some of
(13:29):
the best stories to begin with,and I got to spend a lot of time
in the emergency room growingup.
There was probably even at like15, 16, I would just be hanging
out there.
Sometimes they would be like,yeah, every now and then, you
know, if somebody had to show me, show me something that needed
to be seen, like one time theywere afraid am I getting into
(13:51):
drugs or whatever.
So they took me into like thepsych holding cell.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
And let me interview one of the drugs.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
So you can see firsthand.
This is what it would look likeif you did get bad off in the
drug.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
I never touched another oxy-cot.
Yeah, I think that's reallycool man.
Speaker 2 (14:08):
I don't really have any other physicians in my
family, but my mom is the personwho sort of got me into
medicine.
She started her career out.
She's worked her whole careerat the Baptist Hospital in
Jackson.
I was also born there and mymom worked there in the ER for
10, 15 years.
Then she was a case manager,then she was internal medicine.
She was like a hot nurse forthe hospitalist.
(14:30):
She's done a little bit ofeverything there, but my mom is
a rock star.
She's one of the people thatwanted to go to medical school
and be a pediatrician when shewas growing up, but life got in
the way.
She ended up going the nursingroute and she's one of the best
people I know and she's the onewho got me interested in
medicine.
I remember being a little kidand going to work with her and
(14:50):
that's sort of where I got thebug.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
Dude, that's awesome.
I'm sure she's proud that she'sgot a son now.
I think so.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
But my mom's, one of the seven people that both my
parents actually and it's beengood for me.
But they're the type that theyintentionally make it to where
the bar to please them is high.
But there's a reason, there's amethod to the madness, because
if you to please my parents, yougotta do something exceptional.
(15:18):
And if you wanna make myparents happy and you aim for
something exceptional, you'regonna hit.
You're at least gonna get closeto that.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
That's pretty impressive.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Yeah, I mean.
So you wanna be under novel.
It goes for sports, mixedmartial arts.
Whatever you're doing, you justwanna be excellent.
You don't wanna be excellent inthe sense that you tell
everybody that you're excellent.
You just want the way youperform, just like your whole
essence, the way you set exampleby your actions.
You just want everybody just toknow that you're legit.
You don't have to tell peopleyou're legit.
(15:49):
People who I look at it thisway people who are tough, people
that know how to fight that'smy frame of reference here.
They don't go around and talkabout how they can beat people
up or how good they are atfighting.
They just are.
They don't talk about it.
I feel like it's the same wayin medicine or whatever.
You're good at.
People who are excellent,people that have put in the work
(16:09):
, people who are good at whatthey do, they don't have to talk
about it.
You just do it.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
That's exactly where I wanna be, where I'm standing
in the back, calm, when peoplestart to freak out, and then I
can just easily handle thesituation.
That's the beauty of we willget to do that plenty of times
in our career.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
And it's also one of those things you can't fake that
.
It's not something that you can,no matter how bad you wanna be
the chief, no matter how bad youwanna pad your resume, no
matter how bad you wanna be, thething you can't will that into
existence.
It's something that you earn byputting in the time.
It's not something that you canjust like go out and lobby for
that position, right.
You gain that experience andthat being calm in the center of
(16:49):
the storm by like being good atwhat you do.
And the way you're gonna becomegood at doing this is putting
in the time, doing the educationpart, doing the hands-on part,
spending a lot of time in theemergency room, not being afraid
to pick up the sickest patients, just getting there, getting
your hands dirty and doing thething.
That's what I love most aboutemergency medicine.
Like you, obviously you have tohave the clinical knowledge.
(17:11):
You have to know a little bitabout everything.
We have to be the second bestin every specialty in the
hospital, right?
Which is unique about ourspecialty, we have to know a
little bit about what everybodydoes.
Also, we deal withundifferentiated patients.
That's unique to what we do.
But there's also like ahands-on something you can't
teach aspect of emergencymedicine.
It's kind of just like yougotta be in the moment, take on
(17:33):
the beast as it comes.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
I love the fact that you said the time that it takes,
like he was making his wholepoint on how much time you spend
in the emergency department,because that's really what it is
Like the people that spend themost time you seeing the most
patients.
Those are always the rock stars,whether it's the nurse that's
been there for 20 years For sure, or it's the doc.
So you really gotta get inthere and get your hands dirty.
(17:56):
That's why I always love goinginto the ER for war when I was
in medical school and evenbefore, because half of the time
you got to do a little bit morethan you probably should be.
Speaker 2 (18:09):
I mean, it's one of those things that you gotta go
take what you want right.
Like you can sit there and sortof do the bare minimum and have
people say, oh hey, dr Adne,you need to go do this or you
need to go see that patient.
But if you really wanna be likeyou said, you wanna kind of
have the upper echelon, the wayyou get there is we're all gonna
be there the same amount oftime, like relatively, we all
(18:30):
have the same scheduleultimately, right.
But the way you sort ofseparate yourself from everybody
else would be while you'rethere, don't be afraid to just
pick up any patient, even ifit's something that you know
that you're not really good at,something that you're
uncomfortable with.
Just say, take the plunge.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
That's how you're gonna figure it out.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
You're gonna figure it out by seeing hundreds of
different presentations of thesame thing.
Everybody's a little bitdifferent.
The chaos is always a littlebit different.
There's all these littlefactors that change, but just
getting in the game is howyou're ultimately gonna become
better than the guy next to you.
It's just about being there andnot being afraid to just take
it on.
You gotta be willing to fail ifyou wanna get better at
(19:10):
something.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
Dude, that's the truth and I learned my best from
failure.
That's the one good thing.
I never guessed right the firsttime, but I always remember
when I fail and I won't make thesame mistake twice.
So I know that there was alittle mixup with the questions.
We were rudely interrupted.
I'm sorry, it's the problemwhen you have a wife.
(19:31):
Now I do have to answer toeveryone's call.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
We gotta be careful talking about the lines.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
Well, she knows.
Hopefully she'll be the oneediting this She'll hear it
twice.
So there was a moment, thoughyou were talking about your
mother was your inspiration.
She got you wanting to get intothe hospital early.
That's where you get your time,that's where you get your
mentality and, honestly, it'sthe strong women.
Like, in my family there's a lotof strong women and they're all
(20:00):
in medicine, and so it is funnybecause as a guy too, having a
little lady check you on yourmedical knowledge, you can come
in there real cocky in my houseand then you're gonna feel like
an idiot, leaving Absolutely man.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
I mean I really have enjoyed over the last decade or
so.
I remember when I was first inthe EMT paramedic realm, like
you, didn't really see as manywomen in the specialty, and over
the last decade two decadeswomen have really made a name
for themselves in emergencymedicine and I like to see it.
I think that women bring aunique aspect to it.
(20:36):
I think we all have certainthings that we're good at and I
think having an equal number ofwomen and men there together
just it's not gonna do anythingbut improve things Used to kind
of be a male dominated specialty.
But it's really not that wayanymore.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
No, which I mean that's gotta be a good thing,
because I mean, at the end ofthe day, women are kind of
leading us around anyway leavinga guy?
Yeah, absolutely, At some pointthat was why I had to answer
the call.
Sorry, guys, but this is anexciting month for you because
you've got the baby, you've gotthe micu.
(21:12):
So what?
How?
After the first couple of days,which you have all for whatever
, for the implantation, what isthe next couple of weeks like?
Look for Lindsay.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
Oh, okay, yes, great question.
So pretty much how it'll work.
So we're doing what's called anFET or a frozen embryo transfer
, meaning that once we wentthrough the initial half of the
process, which is I kind of lookat it as like the follicular
phase where you're trying tostimulate egg production, get a
good OO site, try to make goodembryos.
(21:47):
That's sort of the first half,and the second half is sort of
building up the endometriallining, kind of getting
everything ready for animplantation.
So I sort of looked at it astwo different steps and we're
obviously going to be on thesecond half.
So the implantation, assumingall the laboratory testing comes
back and the estrogenprogesterone levels look good
it'll take place on August 1stTuesday.
(22:09):
From there, implantation usuallytakes place one to five days
following that.
But you can't really reliablysay because of all the hormones,
it's sort of like convolutedthings.
So we will wait 10 to 14 daysto do a serum beta HCG which, if
that number comes back on 10 to14 days later it's 200 or
(22:33):
greater.
Then we can reliablycomfortably say that it took and
that we had a successfulimplantation.
That's sort of what we'relooking for.
So there's a lot of differentadvice out there.
It's one of those things wherethere's not a whole lot of
research on showing like what'sbetter post-transfer as far as
like these are the things thatyou need to do to increase
(22:54):
success, or these things havebeen shown to have a negative
correlation with success.
All I really know and from kindof diving into the literature,
obviously you don't want to runa marathon the next day.
You want to keep your stresslevels down, but honestly
there's a lot of stuff that saysyou don't want to just lay in
bed for the next two or threedays.
You kind of want to be up,moving around, you want to avoid
(23:17):
, like extreme temperatures.
That's one thing that'sconsistently pops up.
But hopefully just she'll beoff her feet for a couple of
days I'll sort of wait on herhand and foot and then she can
sort of ease back into herregular routine and come August
14th and hopefully we get thatpositive HCG and we can say that
we're pregnant and go fromthere.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Dude, I'm happy for you.
You should see the smile onthis man's face.
But the funny thing is, lindsaywas probably hoping that she
could at least get some bed restfrom the doctor.
Yeah, doctor's orders sheprobably needs to.
Speaker 2 (23:51):
She just wants a break.
She's a physician assistantworking in the emergency room.
So about my wife initially whenshe finished PA school she was
in general surgery for five, sixyears.
Love surgery Ended up just sortof needing a change, ended up
getting a job in the emergencyroom.
I'm going to de facto takecredit for sort of helping
(24:12):
influence that decision.
She may deny that but I like tothink that I influenced her to
make that change.
She really enjoys the emergencyroom as a mid-level.
Pas are a relatively new thinghere in Mississippi.
There's a big nursepractitioner scene here in
Mississippi but the PA thing wasrelatively new.
So she kind of was on thecutting edge of how are we going
(24:32):
to use physician assistants inthe emergency medicine setting?
in Mississippi, I know it's verycommon in other states, but in
Mississippi PAs in the ER are avery new thing and my wife is
sort of like on the cutting edgeor the front lines of how that
was going to work.
So she mainly does a lot oftriage, which is not her
favorite thing, but then shealso does Probably an equal
(24:54):
number of rapid track shifts.
She also works back in the whatwe call pods with the
attendings Just in the mainadult ED, and she loves it.
She's learned a lot and it'ssomething that we both are able
to talk about, but it isstressful.
It's not really one of the best, most conducive things for
going through a featurefertilization cycle, and that's
(25:15):
not my opinion.
That was one thing that myposition harped on.
He was always like y'all haveway too much stress, so I need
to cut it down, you don't needto tone it back, but at the end
of the day, how are we gonna dothat?
I can't just stop working.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Yeah, you just gave it work.
Did you give him the speechabout rising to the top?
Yeah, why?
That would have been a change.
We're in it now, man.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
We got to keep going forward and we'll figure out a
way to make it work.
And one thing about both mywife and I's we always take the
the difficult path to get places, so we were happy to take on
the challenge.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
That's good.
I'm excited I at least get tosee you for the next three years
before you leave us.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
Yeah, you can have the babysit for me a little bit.
That's fine, I got a goodbabysitter.
Speaker 1 (25:55):
She also edits this podcast.
A lady of many traits, butthat's exciting.
Yes, cheers to you too as well.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
Cheers my friend too, yes, sir.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
Being done with opium .
Speaker 2 (26:08):
So let me ask you a question, and again, this is
something that, if you don'twant to go down this road, we
definitely don't have to.
But are you and Mary best?
Do y'all want to have children?
Is that something y'all haveconsidered or thought about?
Speaker 1 (26:20):
So yeah, we definitely considered it, but at
this time we're not likeparticularly trying.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
I think it's definitely going to happen.
It's kind of what I've beentelling you about how we didn't
need to see any strays Becausewe'll eventually end up with a
right, right, right.
I feel like that's supposed tohappen.
Now.
That is only because that's howmost of the children in my
family are.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
They're coming about.
Speaker 1 (26:42):
Oops, we have a kid down there.
So I'm kind of hoping for that.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
I definitely want them, but Right now, I guess in
full transparency, I think shehas an IUD, so if she got
pregnant that would be a medicalemergency.
Yeah, that'd be a problem.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
Yeah, but yeah.
So not trying right now, but Iassume, like in the future,
maybe a little bit more stable.
Yeah, I mean ultimately, Iguess what I was asking you is
you want to be as being a dad?
Something that you kind of grewup thinking that that's what
you wanted, yeah definitely,definitely, wanted to be a dad,
which, so I mean, I come from apretty big family to begin with.
(27:18):
So I always wanted like atleast a couple, because I know
kids are also like all a littledifferent.
Yeah sometimes that's like thecute thing about it.
Yeah, for sure, man, you know,you never know what you're gonna
get.
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
And I grew up with a.
I have a fraternal twin brother.
His name's Chris.
He's a geotechnical engineer,very boring, and Outside of
Atlanta.
He lives in a town calledMarietta.
But when you have a twingrowing up, you always have a
person.
There's always somebody likenot only did we share a womb
upon intended, but also like wekind of went through the same
(27:52):
stages of life together at theexact same time.
So you know, having siblingswas something that, in my mind,
was indispensable with like theway my life played out going
forward.
My wife is Sort of an onlychild.
She grew up with half siblings,but she doesn't have an actual
full-blood sibling of her own,and that's something she always
talks about, especially when westarted talking about having
(28:14):
kids.
Is she definitely wants to?
If we're fortunate enough tohave a baby, we would love to
have to, but especially aftereverything that we've went
through, one is plenty, but I dothink that Growing up in life
with a sibling is something Iwould like for my future kid to
maybe experience it for four.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
Yeah yeah Well, dude, you never know like we I think
we had even talked about thistoo sometimes, especially when
it's just happenstance that it'snot taking whenever one baby
comes, another one.
So yeah, yeah you may end upwith more than you want, but
that is a very, very excitingmoment for you.
(28:53):
I'm yeah, it's gonna be, it'sgonna be great.
At least she'll be able to havesome bed rest and you won't
even know about it becauseyou'll be at the make, you, yeah
exactly.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
And then one of the things the older I get, I sort
of have one thing that sort ofconsistently ends up being true
that you realize when you getolder is that the the times in
life, when you are dealtsomething or encounter something
that you were not expecting,like a unexpected difficulty in
your life.
Though, in overcoming thosethings, those are the things
(29:22):
that end up being the mostmeaningful to you.
So don't be afraid of taking achallenge.
You know, being a parent isdefinitely a challenge, like a
lot of people, especiallymedical people, when they're
going through school andtraining they're.
I can't have a kid, I'm inmedical school.
I can't have a kid.
I'm going through residency andI keep just kicking that can
down the road, but I'm just hereto tell you that you can do
(29:42):
more than you think you can.
If, if a dumb meathead fromMadison, mississippi, can uh,
you know get in to an ERresidency and potentially become
an ER doctor, then you can dodo more than you realize?
Speaker 1 (29:54):
No, dude, technically you are an ER doctor, so don't.
Speaker 2 (29:57):
Yeah, that's right, I am an ER doctor, I'm still
getting comfortable with that,right?
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Yeah, you're your name sounds so similar to my
last name that I now startthinking that even when you
introduce yourself that you'rereferring to me.
So when people are calling fordr Abdeen, I'm gonna be so
confused.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Yeah, abney abdeen, I didn't really think about that,
but yeah, it does, it does kindof it does get confusing.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
So that's fun because I've actually never met
somebody that had such a similar.
There's been people that havehad Very few people have a last
name where they're above me onthe list right.
So just to that dude.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
ABD, abd.
I mean the only people who beatme, or the AA ronds, for all
you key and pill fans out there.
Speaker 1 (30:40):
Yeah, the, so oh shoot.
What was I got to say?
There was, uh, I don't know,man, I can't read your mind, I
know.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
Oh well, I can interject here.
One question I have for you iswhat is something that you are
most, whether it be like aspecific skill or a particular
rotation, or maybe it's just thewhole thing globally?
What are you most lookingforward to, or what do you want
to get out of your intern yearmore than anything else?
Speaker 1 (31:08):
Ooh, that's a good question.
I would have to say that theone thing that I want to get out
from the intern year Is that Iwant to get really good at like
procedures and making sure thatI know, skill-wise, what I'm
doing.
Yeah, yeah, I know that somethings are going to still slip
my mind and stuff like that, butI want to get the hands-on
(31:30):
experience over and over andover again.
Now, that makes sense and if Ican at least get that down, I
feel like I might be worth adamn in the future.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, there's a huge learningcurve and, like Rome wasn't
built in a day, you can't do itall in a year, but that seems
like a good goal to me, beingthere personally.
Speaker 1 (31:48):
after a year, what is your goal?
Speaker 2 (31:50):
for me, I guess the biggest my.
I sort of have like a very I'mvery goal oriented.
I have to have very specificgoals.
It's just something I need tokind of move myself forward.
So for this year I want to getto where I can reliably that's
the key word reliably See atleast one patient per hour.
Reliably, um, so if you takethe average over the time and
(32:13):
I'm working in the yard, if Ican, as an intern, reliably see
a patient an hour every time Iwork, uh, or get to that point
by the end of the year, I willconsider that a success and
anything above that or beyond.
That would be fantastic.
But at least one patient perhour, that's a goal.
Another goal of mine is just tokind of there.
One of the big things you haveto make the transition from
(32:34):
medical school to Actually beinga doctor is your decisions
actually carry a little bit moreweight, kind of getting a
little more comfortable in therole as far as like knowing why
I'm doing something.
So in the past, where it's likeyou're doing medical questions
or board questions, you say oh,the answer is this we're doing
this because you remember abuzzword.
I want to be able to always sayI'm ordering this test Because
(32:58):
this, or we need to do thisprocedure because why?
Like actually understanding theins and outs of exactly why I'm
doing something, exactly when Ineed to do something?
That's also very important tome, so actually kind of learning
the details that you didn'treally or weren't expected to
know as a medical student.
Plus, see a patient an hourthat's my goal.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
Yeah, that that patient an hour is good, that's
good workflow.
Yeah, do you think that yourgoal oriented like scheduling,
like where you're you're goingby goal by goal is because of
the Fighting background that youessentially was it?
Speaker 2 (33:29):
did it start there like work?
Speaker 1 (33:31):
because for sure you were in high school, when you
were Fighting right when youcame out.
Yeah, so were you goal orientedeven back then?
Speaker 2 (33:39):
always I have to have .
I'm just the type of personthat I have to have A very
specific set of objectives thatI'm trying to meet.
Otherwise it's very hard todirect my energy and focus Into
like a productive matter ifyou're trying to focus on
everything then it's verydifficult to focus on anything.
(33:59):
If that makes sense, you sort ofhave to pick some short-term
goals, like you obviously wantto have a long-term goal, like
Eventually, I want to be anattending your physician who can
handle whatever comes throughthe door, but in order to get
there you got to take some babysteps along the way, right, and
it's important to kind of keepthose objectives in your mind
because ultimately we become thethings that we do and the
(34:21):
things that we think about.
So if you consistently tellyourself, my goal for this
rotation or my goal for thisyear is to meet this objective,
just by virtue of setting thatwhether you write it down,
whether you just like set itfirmly in your mind Setting that
goal Is going to make you morelikely to actually accomplish
that goal, if that makes sense.
(34:41):
It's a little woo-woo, but itdoes work.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
No, if you need a, if you need a pep up, that means
for anybody listen.
If you need a good pep talk,this guy's want to go to.
He'll get you in your head.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
Yeah, man, I mean you were an athlete growing up too,
so I mean I know you did thisto some degree like you played
football.
Right, yeah, what position didyou play in football?
I played defensive in.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
You're defensive, yeah, and I played tight in like
a little bit in college andthen I also oh cool, I didn't
make a good college football,that's the cooler man.
So think about when you weredoing that right, like when
you're in the offseason.
You.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Whether you actually like thought about it
consciously or not, you did havelittle small goals that you
were trying to meet toeventually get you to.
Whatever your end goal was,whether it be I want to start on
the college team or I want todo x, y, z, whatever it is you
have to take steps along the way.
It's just something that,especially in mixed martial arts
because the way I like to thinkabout it is similar to
(35:36):
emergency medicine in that theyboth of those things involve
high level problem solving withdire consequences for failure.
Right, and whenever you'regoing to be engaged in activity
like that, that has a lot of youhave to have a lot of skin in
the game doing something likethat.
And in order to get yourself toa place to where you can
comfortably take on thatchallenge, you got to start
(35:57):
small.
You got to say I can relateeverything back to martial arts,
like, okay, I want to make surethat my boxing is good.
My goal for this month is towork on my boxing, get to where
I can do three, three minuterounds just with the boxing
gloves.
On next month, I want to workon my jiu jitsu.
I want to get it to whatevermetric.
I'm trying to meet same withwrestling and that way, when you
(36:19):
have a fight, and in may fightin the distance, I can say I met
this objective of my wrestling,this objective with my boxing
this with my kickboxing and thenthat way if I knew I met
objective A, b and C, then myglobal objective of not getting
my ass kicked in the fight isgoing to be more likely to be
met if I can say that I did this, this and this, as opposed to
(36:41):
just my goal going in, beinglike I'm just gonna, I'm just
gonna get good.
Like what does that mean right?
for me and again like you, maybe a superhuman I'm not, but I
have to directly focus on whatI'm trying to accomplish in
order to like make that progress, and for me it takes making a
list of, like I want to do this,this and this.
(37:03):
I know I've kind of harped on abunch of times, but it's super
important dude, I love it.
Speaker 1 (37:07):
Yeah, corey has one of the best like the icebreaker
question answers when they say,hey, go around the room and just
tell us something unique aboutyourself.
And then Corey's like, yeah, myprofessional fighting career
record is, you know, and it'ssomething that you, you've got a
solid record, it's something inthe 20.
Speaker 2 (37:25):
I don't even like the sort of number on it, man, it's
even hard to quantify it.
Speaker 1 (37:29):
We're jumping right back in, we had some technical
issues.
This is the first time thatthis, our new studio, has been
in use.
In the Jackson studio we stillgot some things to by taking
real difficulties.
Speaker 2 (37:41):
He means that I clumsily knocked the microphone
off of the stand, so this is hisfirst time, you're really yes
hey, you're doing great to startoff with and I mean my
difficulties.
Speaker 1 (37:54):
You should have seen us.
When we first started I had Icould not figure out the mic
stuff at all one of the mics.
One time we did multiple oneswhere only one mic was working.
Oh, I can only imagine.
And then it took me towards theend of the whole thing to
figure out that there was anissue yeah, I'm a big podcast
fan.
Speaker 2 (38:13):
Like you know sounds cliche, I guess some people will
probably make fun of me forthis, but I'm a big Joe Rogan
podcast listener.
Like Shane Gillis, I like allthe comedian podcasts I'm super
into, have grown up listening tohim and sort of like my I've
always had this like desire towant to do a podcast.
In fact, my brother and Ialways talk about, oh, we should
(38:33):
do one, we should do one, and Ialways hear a lot of people say
that.
But it's definitely somethingthat I think a lot of people out
there think that, oh, you justsit down and you talk.
It's a lot more complicatedthan that.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
It's certainly it's just a different type, but
sometimes you can especially onlonger ones, like you can
actually get to a point whereyou're just vibing or you're
just talking, and that'ssometimes when you get the best
out of the conversation, andit's really just you were saying
it right before we sat down.
Back down is that we can me andthis guy, we hit it off early
(39:03):
because we could just talk aboutanything for like a long time,
and so it really sometimes itjust works out, but it
definitely is a different, likeskill yeah like I should my own
voice.
So having to hear my own voice,oh yeah, on top of that.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
I definitely don't like it's.
I don't like seeing myself avideo, I don't like hearing my
voice and recording.
But I'm sure I'm not alone inthat.
But I do like you, so I liketalking to you.
No problem, this is easy sickit is.
Speaker 1 (39:27):
Uh, the feeling is mutual and honestly I feel like,
for your first time, and it'sgoing good, it's gonna do.
I mean, this is his first timecoming out as a doctor, so
you're gonna be literally rightthere on the floor and it's
gonna be it's gonna be anexciting month.
I do.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
I'm so excited.
I mean, I'd be lying if Ididn't admit that I am nervous,
but more than I am nervous, I'mexcited.
I'm excited to finally.
This has been like a big, longprocess in the making for me.
This is something I've wantedto do for a long time.
A lot of people, you know theyget to get in the game early.
They're.
They start when they're 22.
(40:03):
They start residency whenthey're still in their 20s.
I'm 35 years old, so you know,at least in my medical school
class I used to always joke thatI was the class dad.
Speaker 1 (40:12):
Oh, he is now too.
He's a.
We've literally been talking.
Yeah well, I don't even meanit's about to be the dad.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
I don't even mean it in like that, since I just meant
that I was the oldest one in mymedical school class by like
significantly, um, but that'snot the case in my residency
class.
I'll say our residency.
Our group of interns isactually a very cool, unique,
diverse group.
We have people of all differentages, all different backgrounds
.
I know it sounds cliche to saythat, oh, I love my co-interns
(40:41):
and co-residents, but we do havea really, really good group in
addition to our upper levels.
They're all very cool peopletoo, yeah.
Speaker 1 (40:47):
I you're not the oldest, aren't you?
Yeah, not at all there's.
I'm not naming names, I'm nottrying to out anybody's age, but
yeah, you know who you are,definitely not the oldest one,
which is uh, which is differentfor me that was something that
that for me.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
At the beginning, especially in medical school, I
was very self-conscious aboutmm-hmm.
I don't really even think aboutit anymore, but when I started
medical school at William Carey,I had not been in a classroom
in probably nine years, so thatwas a very huge adjustment, in
addition to having to commute 90miles every day because I was
living here and the school Iwent to was in a different city.
(41:23):
So but I mean, like again, I'mpreaching to the choir you, you
moved to an island and youtraveled all over the country
and we do what we got to do toaccomplish the things we want to
do.
Speaker 1 (41:33):
Dang right the good thing about medical school, too,
is there is older people too.
That I noticed, like even in mymedical school, there was
always like an older person too,which is awesome.
You got to do what you got todo.
You had a whole life.
We were talking about it beforethe whole uh mic incident.
But I mean, this guy, how long,how long did you fight for?
Speaker 2 (41:53):
long time.
I mean I started doing um.
I mean, if I was to go all theway back, I started doing
martial arts when I was probablyfour or five years old.
But I started doing Brazilianjujitsu and really getting into
the mixed martial arts realm ofit when I was 13 years old.
I did that all the way throughmy, you know, mid to late 20s.
Some of that time I was doingamateur mixed martial arts,
(42:14):
professional mixed martial arts.
A lot of Brazilian Jiu Jitsutournaments Me and some of my
buddies we competed on anational level with Jiu Jitsu
went all over the country.
A really good friend of mine andtraining partner of mine
competed in.
The two of them actuallycompeted in the Abu Dhabi trials
, which if you're a Jiu Jitsunerd out there, you'll know what
I'm talking about.
We went to the East Coasttrials and that's something that
(42:36):
I got to do at a very highlevel and it was a very
important and impactful thing inmy life.
It's a unique thing.
It definitely made me theperson that I am and then also
kind of just having thatexperience of getting to live a
whole another life before goingto med school I think ultimately
makes me a better doctor, andwhat I mean by that specifically
(42:59):
is that I feel like I'm moreable to relate to the common
person as opposed to like justnot saying anything negative
about my colleagues that weresmart enough and disciplined
enough to like go all the waythrough.
That's also super impressive,but sometimes I feel like the
non-traditional students get abad rap sometimes.
(43:21):
But I feel like DO schools andthe Caribbean schools do a good
job of giving us a shot and I'mbiased, but I think we make
pretty good doctors.
Speaker 1 (43:31):
Yeah, some would say the best doctors.
Speaker 2 (43:34):
Hey, you said that.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
No, dude For one, probably the best doctors, but
we won't make claims.
Yeah, but that whole lifebefore that had to be so.
Yeah, that just makes you a lotmore unique.
And the best thing is when hesaid his record in front of the
program director and everythingour program director was like
yeah, I'm pretty sure he's ablack belt.
(43:56):
Nobody should mess with Corey.
Yeah, because you're a blackbelt, right?
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (44:00):
yeah, I've got a black belt and a few different
things.
I've just been doing martialarts my whole life and I do
recommend anybody out therelistening that has ever wanted
to try it, whether even ifyou're an adult and feel like,
oh, I'm too old to start, at thevery least I recommend
everybody out here listening goout and start or at least do
some amount or some classes ofBrazilian Jiu-Jitsu, just for
(44:21):
self-defense purposes.
I think that you will.
It's a great exercise.
Find a good gym, you won't gethurt doing it and it's also very
practical.
It's sort of designed for asmaller, like not necessarily
professional fighter person tobe able to take on a much bigger
, much more even skilledopponent as far as like somebody
(44:42):
who may be a kickboxer, but ifyou know the ground game, it's
something that you can at leastgive yourself a fighting chance.
I recommend that for women,self-defense and guys out there,
go do it.
Speaker 1 (44:53):
I mean, I definitely need to start.
I think we're going to startoff with some little foxy boxing
.
Yeah, we should we definitelyshould, man, I was just, but I
definitely am going to have tocome and learn from you, or at
least let you choke me out onceor twice.
Speaker 2 (45:08):
I can do that, and since we're talking about that I
want to give a shout out to ifyou're here in Jackson
Mississippi, go check out noLimit Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and
MMA under Jarrett Beck's,randall Powell, johnny Little
and all his guys.
Those are the big guys here inJackson to go learn from Very
cool people.
You will learn a lot.
(45:28):
I decided to put that plug inoh, you got to dude.
Speaker 1 (45:31):
and this guy trust me when your program director is
working.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
Anthony Mitchell, clayton Pitts them also.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
So the one thing about your previous career he
has one of the best photos ofhimself that will talk pretty
much to anybody else's in theirhouse where he's pummeling a
guy's face and it's just like Ithink it was your debut or
whatever, in the USC orsomething like that.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
It was a fight in Little Rock, Arkansas.
Back in I think it was 2009 or10, that picture you're talking
about Pretty cool.
That was when I was young andhad a bunch of just ripped up
muscles.
I had youth on my side then, soit's a cool picture to have
hanging in your house.
Speaker 1 (46:10):
Oh yeah, certainly I'm working on getting one of
those for myself.
Okay, so first you were afighter and then switched to
paramedics.
What was the transition like?
Did you injure yourself andthen?
Speaker 2 (46:25):
No, it wasn't even that.
It was just one of those thingsthat I knew when I was a little
kid.
I used to always say I wantedto be a doctor.
I'm not one of those peoplewho's going to say I wanted to
be a doctor since I was fiveyears old, because nobody really
knows what they want to do whenthey're five.
But from when I was old enoughto kind of be cognizant of the
world around me 12, 13, I knewthat I wanted to be a doctor.
(46:46):
It was just a matter of if Ibelieved in myself to do it.
What was it going to take toget there?
I also really loved martial arts.
That's like my other second bigpassion in life.
I just knew that I wasn't goingto do it for a career.
And as far as you can trainyour entire life, you can go be
part of a jiu-jitsu club or akickboxing club for your whole
life.
(47:06):
It's very good exercise andit's that.
But if you're going to compete,particularly in the mixed
martial arts aspect of it, it'ssomething that you need to at
least be able to say to yourselfI'm all in, because if you're
not all in, you're probablygoing to fight somebody who's
all in, particularly when youstart getting to the higher
levels of it.
You don't want to lock yourselfinto a cage with another man.
(47:26):
If you're not all in and he'sin there fighting for his family
, you're going to lose.
I just knew it wasn't going tobe my career and so I just
decided you got to know when tohang it up and start focusing on
the school and things like that.
Speaker 1 (47:40):
That's the exact same thing that happened with me for
football.
There was a moment in collegewhere I realized that I wasn't
going to do anything with thisand then it felt I don't know.
It all faded from what it wasBecause it used to be war.
Oh, when your testosterone ishigh, everything is a perceived.
You get your band of brothersand you go to war, and so I just
(48:05):
it.
Eventually, you just startmaking goals in a different
direction.
Speaker 2 (48:07):
Right.
One good thing, though, is oneof the things I miss the most
when I kind of stepped away fromfull time doing martial arts,
doing mixed martial arts, youdid see was that camaraderie,
that team aspect, and that's oneof the reasons I was drawn to
emergency medicine.
It's one of those medicalspecialties where I really do
feel like there is a verypalpable team aspect of it.
(48:31):
It's very similar to being partof like a martial arts gym.
We're all going through a lotof hardcore things, seeing a lot
of hardcore things, puttingourselves in vulnerable
situations.
We're all doing it together,and you can't do it by yourself.
It requires like a whole teamof people to be able to get the
job done.
So emergency medicine kind ofreally did help to fill that
(48:51):
void.
So that is one reason I kind ofwas drawn to the specialty.
In addition to that, just asfar as going back to my
background, the transition onceI sort of got out of competitive
martial arts was my undergraddegree is in biochemistry from
the University of Mississippi,ole Miss, hotty, toddy, hotty,
toddy.
Speaker 1 (49:12):
Yeah, we're the rebels.
Now, dude, yeah, the rebels,that's right.
Speaker 2 (49:15):
But I used my degree.
My dad and I actually got apatent for wastewater treatment
for chicken plants here inMississippi.
So we sort of came up with aprocess patent, which a process
patent is not just like onespecific thing you get a patent
on, it's the entirety of theprocess.
So we had a micro screen thatwe added chemical separation to.
(49:39):
Sort of all the things togetherwas our own unique process.
Really, it all started because alocal chicken plant in Canton,
mississippi, was kind of ranafoul of the Mississippi
Department of EnvironmentalQuality regulations for like
what levels of bacteria andoxygen demand and all these
things of the water itself, andthey were getting fined
(50:03):
thousands and thousands, tens ofthousands dollars a day.
And my dad is an attorney.
He had a relationship with himthat way and then sort of
segwayed into maybe we can helpyou fix this problem, and with
myself with my degree inbiochemistry, my brother who's
an engineer, my dad, who's anattorney but also just one of
the smartest people we've evermet, we all kind of banded
together and sort of came upwith a solution to this problem
(50:26):
and implemented it.
And that was a very cool partof my journey through this life,
too, was getting to work withmy dad and that.
So taking that step and thenrealizing I need to probably
start doing some more medicalthings, and took the EMT route
and worked as a patienttransporter at St Dominic's and
I've done it all.
Speaker 1 (50:47):
Hey All White Co listeners.
I hate to cut it short, but meand Corey talked for so long
that I had to split up into twoepisodes, so follow us along
next week for the second part ofthis episode.
Thank you again for everybodythat listens.
We appreciate you and good luckto everybody that's going
through the match process rightnow.
We'll see you next week.
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