- July 26, 2021
- ByMichael Dolister
Our ApolloMD Executive Board proudly awards the 4th Annual Emergency Medicine Scholarship to Travis Eurick, MD, currently a resident at Kaiser Permanente in San Diego, California.
“ApolloMD’s goal is to reward young physicians for their focus on providing top-quality care to the communities they serve,” said Dr. Michael Dolister, ApolloMD CEO. “We know the future of health care lies in the hands of dedicated resident physicians like Dr. Eurick who work hard to gain experience and learn the practice of medicine. We hope by offering this annual scholarship we can reduce a small portion of the financial burden.”
Dr. Eurick was barely a teenager when his father succumbed to sudden cardiac arrest. The tragic incident sparked a mission, driving him to seek out ways to prevent others from experiencing such a devastating loss. That motivation pushed him toward the study of health care, influencing his decision to double major in Human Biology and Health Promotion and Disease Prevention at University of Southern California, and then on to USC’s Keck School of Medicine.
“After navigating my grief, I developed a conviction to prevent others from experiencing the suffering of premature death,” he reflects. “As a future emergency medicine physician, I hope to accomplish this goal by caring for patients and their families in their time of greatest need.”
His time in school has been marked not only by academic success, but also by a commitment to community service. Dr. Eurick regularly volunteered in economically challenged neighborhoods, worked with a missionary group in Mexico, and served as vice-president of the USC Homelessness Outreach Partnership for Education and Empowerment (HOPE2).
“I have discovered that I find my joy in serving the underserved,” he reveals, “…I find it fulfilling to care for the working-class community that supported me in my endeavor to become a physician. In this spirit, I aim to treat patients who would otherwise fall through the cracks in our health care system. I am drawn to emergency medicine because it will allow me to meet patients at the front door, providing care with procedural interventions and imaging to whoever needs me, whenever they need me.”
Dr. Eurick embraces the challenges he knows are ahead of him as he embarks on this next stage in his medical career. “As I enter this next step in my training,” he says, “I am also keeping an open mind to the many sub-specialty and fellowship options offered to emergency medicine physicians. A bit of an analytics geek, at this time I would say I have a particular interest in administration and implementing cost-effective measures to cut down wait times and safely care for as many patients as possible.”
“As a first-generation college graduate, it still feels surreal that I get to live out my dream of being a physician. For students like me, generous gifts like the ApolloMD scholarship quite literally make it possible for us to achieve that which would otherwise be financially intangible. Thank you to ApolloMD for investing in the next generation of physicians, and for helping me bring medical care to whoever needs it, whenever they need it.”
Scholarship program candidates are evaluated on the strength of their application as well as assessment of scholarly achievements, philanthropic endeavors, proven leadership skills, and involvement with accredited medical societies/organizations. Applicants must be pursuing a career in emergency medicine, be in good standing with a US allopathic or osteopathic medical school and be participating in the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP).
According to the Association of American Medical Colleges, the median debt for the class of 2020 was $200,000. The median 4-year cost of attendance for the class of 2021 totaled $259,347 for public medical schools and $346,955 for private medical schools.
Click here to view the Medical Student Education: Debt, Costs, and Loan Repayment Fact Card.
The 2022 scholarship application will open January 1 with a deadline of June 15. For more information, or to apply for 2022, visit apollomd.com.