Driven by ambition and discipline from years of gymnastics training, Robert Seung-Bok Lee is out to prove that the word "disabled" does not apply to fulfilling one's dreams.
"S. B." Lee, a second year Dartmouth Medical School student, is one of only a few quadriplegic medical students in the country.
"It is not as impossible as some think," Lee said. Lee, 28 years old, has been wheelchair-bound since he injured himself training for the Korean Olympic squad almost 10 years ago.
Lee said although he may have difficulty in surgery because of his disability, he is not interested in pursuing surgery as a field. Instead, Lee said he is interested in rehabilitative medicine and primary care.
"My dream would be to incorporate rehab and public health in Southeast Asia," Lee said.
"I'd like to pioneer rehabilitative medicine in Korea, which is neglected there," he said. "The Southeast Asian culture generally looks down upon disabled people."
Lee and his parents emigrated from Korea when he was eight years old to "the land of promising opportunities, the good ol' U.S. of A.," he said.
"When I was eight, my dream was to become an Olympic gold medalist," Lee said. "I saw the Summer Olympics for the first time and was inspired by gymnast Nadia Comaneci. Then I realized that this was my calling."
For the next 10 years Lee worked on his gymnastic skills and, when he was 18 years old, was invited to join the Korean Olympic training squad. He competed in the high-bar, pommel horse, rings, floor, parallel bars and vault events.
But nine months after he qualified for the Olympic training squad, Lee dislocated his cervical vertebra while learning a new move for his floor exercise routine. He was paralyzed from the shoulders down.
"During the hospital stay I was mad at the doctors because they told me I would be wheelchair-bound for the rest of my life," Lee said.
"I felt hopeless, as if my life went down the drain. But for three or four months after the injury I was determined to recover, still driven by the dream of Olympic gold."
After a year of hospitalization and intense rehabilitation, Lee said he regained limited movement in his arms and hands. It was during this stay in the hospital that he thought of pursuing a career in medicine.
"At the hospital I thought the doctors were supposed to be kind and compassionate. But it was the opposite; I felt as if I were the doctors' project," he said.
After he left the hospital, Lee went to an undergraduate college in New York and then obtained a master's degree in public health from Columbia University.
"Many people told me discouraging things [at his undergraduate college]. They didn't think it was possible for me to become a doctor," Lee said.
"I almost believed that they were right. They would say things like 'what happens when there is an emergency and you have to rush to a ward?' " he said.
After completing his master's thesis at Columbia, Lee worked for the World Health Organization and then applied to a number of medical schools including Dartmouth.
He said he applied to Dartmouth because he read the school's catalog and it seemed that it was very supportive of those with handicaps.
Lee also said he wanted to spend his medical school years away from city life. He had previously lived in New York City and Los Angeles.
Lee said his time at DMS has been difficult, but his classmates have been cooperative and supportive.
"They are the ones who get me going here," he said.
Lee said he spoke with most of the clinical clerkship directors at the medical school about overcoming difficulties with ward rotations. And so far, he said most of his rotations have been doable.
But Lee said he has a major problem with transportation.
"I have a lot of trouble going to classes, to libraries and to the hospital -- especially during Hanover winters. I have to rely on my classmates for this."
Lee said if things do not work out he may have to transfer to another school to complete his studies.
"I feel limited in a sense. I want to be independent and experience everything, but I get the sense that this place is not really 'handicap friendly' and they don't want to listen," Lee said.
He said the DMS should try to "make a more active effort to be more sensitive to the needs of the physically disabled."
Lee said he often thinks about how patients will react to him. "I wonder sometimes how they perceive me and my capabilities. This thought caused me to feel a bit insecure whenever I was introducing myself to a new patient."
"But the positive thing about being physically limited is that [patients] are willing to open up to me. I have experienced this first hand by working with a family practitioner, Dr. John Radebaugh, in a rural health clinic in Vermont," he said.
"By sharing my experience I learned that it can help to share the ground between doctor and patient," he said.
Lee's unyielding ambition and discipline have always kept him going.
"I have always felt ambitious. Gymnastics added discipline to that ambition," Lee said. "For the Olympics you have to train hours a day. I trained five to six hours a day, six days a week, for ten years. This lifestyle added to the determination and molded me into my personality."
Lee said he still misses gymnastics. "Even now there are times when I wish I could be tumbling or swinging on the bar, but my body can't keep up with my mind."
Lee said he has one message for anyone with high aspirations -- "You need discipline and strong convictions. You really have to be convinced about your desires. If there is any doubt, it becomes difficult."
