Stanford Health Care Features Timothy Chang, MD
Why Stanford?
There’s no doubt the culture of our department is very special. It starts from the top with Dr. Skinner, our chair. She creates an environment that works for each of us and puts us in a position to thrive. Before I came to med school, my background was in engineering. I’ve always been interested in innovation and technology, and Stanford provides that. This was the best environment for me.
How did you get into urology?
I wanted to do something surgical because, as an engineer, I wanted something that was hands-on. During my surgery rotation a couple of faculty in urology made a strong impression on me. I felt like this was the right type of quirkiness, and the type of people I found myself attracted to, both in terms of patient population as well as my colleagues. I focused on kidney stones for my fellowship. Endourology is a field that uses a lot of technology – it’s mostly scopes. With kidney stones there’s a lot of patients that have acute episodes. Taking care of patients when they’re in distress, the clinical side of things is rewarding.
What did you do after you finished studying engineering and before you started medical school?
While attending grad school for mechanical engineering, I was exposed to medicine through my research. I had to learn about biomedical devices, which I had never been exposed to before. So, my advisor told me to observe in the operating room. There I saw all the tools that I’m familiar with through engineering but used for medicine and working with patients on an individual level. That began my interest in medicine.
In engineering, you’re trying to solve a lot of big scale problems and hopefully change things for the better for a lot of people. But there’s something personal about medicine and surgery that spoke to me. You get to know the patient; you get to know their family. It was a tough decision but ultimately, I have not looked back. I took two or three years of pre-med coursework before entering medical school.
What do you enjoy when you are not working?
My time is consumed with my family. My son is going to be 13 and my daughter is 11. They do a sport called fencing which ends up being a family activity because of the travel required to attend national events.
Anything else?
If somebody asked me 20 years ago where I would be right now, I would never have thought I would be in medicine. I believe a divine hand led me here, and I just hope to give back to the talented students, residents and colleagues in the Stanford community that make this place special and helped me to be here today.
-By Genevieve Bookwalter, Stanford Medicine Chief of Staff Office
