Family Crisis Sparks Mayo Clinic Medical Student’s Journey to Critical Care
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Campus: Florida
Hometown: Cleveland, Ohio
Undergraduate School: Ohio State University
Graduating Year: 2025
GORDON XIE found his calling to medicine at a young age. While he was in high school, a family member was hospitalized with a mysterious medical condition.
“When my family was at the hospital, there were moments where things could go one way or another,” Gordon says. “Everybody’s scared, and seeing the doctors bring out the best side of us made me really want to be able to do that for somebody else.”
Gordon believes that medicine is “the intersection of science and service,” and he sees his role as that of a teacher, informing and guiding patients and their families in times of crisis.
Spurred by his personal experience, Gordon volunteered with the homeless, youth and veteran populations near Ohio State University, further cementing his commitment to serving the most vulnerable. It also has led him to an interest in critical care medicine, a career path, he explains, that wouldn’t have been an option without the scholarship he received from Mayo Clinic benefactors.
“If I graduated with hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt, I would feel pressure to choose a career path to easily pay back my loans,” Gordon says. “This scholarship has removed money from the equation and empowered me to choose the field of medicine I am most passionate about.”
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