All four one, one four all

Neurosurgery, cardiology and internal medicine are the medical specialties chosen by four former New Iberia students who graduated from the 2009 Louisiana State University School of Medicine, not individually, but as members of the same graduating class.

Seth Hayes, D. J. Daly, Alison Trappey and Ben Boudreaux are friends and former classmates who became physicians simultaneously.

All but Hayes graduated from Catholic High School. Hayes attended CHS but transferred and graduated from St. Thomas More High School in Lafayette. All four went on to different colleges before their paths converged again in medical school.

“I really think the inspiration was my dad,” said Hayes, who explained the roundabout way music influenced him to become a doctor. “He played in the local band Hit and Run. I grew up around those guys, and three of them were physicians. They were the go-to guys in my family.”

Hayes attended the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, where he was named Outstanding Graduate for 2005. During med school he chose neurosurgery as his future specialty.

The benefits of sharing such a demanding academic program with friends he has known for years was incomparable.

“You have resources there who aren’t just acquaintances, but friends from childhood. It was a fun ride,” he said.

Daly agreed. Not only did he share his medical training with friends but also with family.

“Alison (Trappey) is my cousin,” Daly said.” It was great being in school together.”

Daly will specialize in cardiology.

Rather than practicing medicine he would prefer to teach, a desire that limits he and his wife Lauren’s options for relocation, since there will need to be appropriate facilities nearby. Although he would love to return to Louisiana after he completes his residency, his career options would be somewhat limited if he does.

“If I do academics, we would live in either Baton Rouge or New Orleans, where there are teaching universities.”

Unlike her cousin and friends, Trappey hadn’t decided on a career in medicine early in her life, but she remembers clearly the experience that led her to study internal medicine.

“I was working at a health care clinic in Iowa,” Trappey said. “I spent a summer providing community service, and seeing the care they needed helped me make up my mind.”

Uncertain beyond her September wedding plans and completing her residency, she admits considering New Orleans as a possible future home.

Trappey found that having familiar faces surrounding her through medical school an advantage, she said, and while she knows it will be difficult to stay in touch now that everyone’s in different locations, she hopes for the best.

Boudreaux is in Dallas waiting to begin his residency in neurosurgery.

“I’ll be in the department of neurosurgery from the beginning,” Boudreaux said. “It’s a seven-year residency, because it’s a surgical specialty.”

Boudreaux realized how beneficial it was having old friends accompany him through med school. In addition to the satisfaction of finding friends studying with him, Boudreaux said the experience quickly became even more novel due to catastrophe.

“Our experience was different because of Katrina,” Boudreaux said. “We started a week before it hit New Orleans.”

The New Orleans’ evacuation forced the school to find other facilities. Boudreaux found himself studying closer to home; first in Baton Rouge and then at the University Medical Center in Lafayette.

While none of the group is certain where they’ll wind up Hayes voiced an opinion understandable to many throughout the Teche Area.

“When you’re born and raised a Cajun,” Hayes said, “it’s hard not to come back.”