Q: Can you share a bit about your background and how your family influenced your interest in medicine?

A: “Both sides of my family are Jamaican, and my grandparents migrated to England during the Windrush generation. I was born in England, and my family migrated to Orlando, Florida, in the ’90s. When I was 4 years old, my grandmother had hypertension, and there was a moment where I was left alone with her in the hospital. A health care provider came in, handed her a little white cup, said ‘Take your medicine’ and just left the room. There was no explanation, no ‘Good morning, how are you?’ I watched as my grandmother put the pills in her mouth, and then she opened a drawer on the side of her bed and spat them out. There were like 30 pills in that drawer. Shortly after, she died from complications of high blood pressure, which now as a physician I recognize as absolutely treatable.

My mom remembers walking to the parking lot with me, and I said, ‘I’m going to be a doctor one day.’ It wasn’t just that I was going to be a physician. I wanted to be the type of physician who imparts empathy along with education and doesn’t demean patients by saying, ‘Just take this’ without them fully understanding their disease process.”

Q: What did your path to becoming a physician look like?

A: “I went to undergrad at the University of Miami. I remember freshman year being excited and finishing my first semester with all As and one B+. I told my adviser, ‘I’m going to medical school,’ and she was like, ‘You’re not going to medical school. Minorities do better in health psychology, and with a B+, you’re not likely to get in.’ That was the last time I spoke with anybody who would tell me no, and that’s where the title of my book, ‘Lessons on Perseverance,’ came from. I went on to medical school at the Morehouse School of Medicine in Atlanta.”

Q: How did you become interested in orthopedic surgery?

A: “I had in my mind that I was going to be a neurosurgeon. But I toggled back and forth between different types of surgery. I didn’t even know about orthopaedic surgery until I was a first-year medical student. I’d never heard of it because it’s kind of a privileged specialty. But I had a mentor, Dr. Bonnie Simpson Mason, who hosted a workshop on orthopaedics and bones at Morehouse. She’s this petite, well-dressed Black woman, and I was like, ‘I relate. I look at you, and I can be you. If she’s an orthopaedic surgeon, I know I can do it.’ If you don’t see it, you can’t be it.

We did this hands-on bone lab where they give you different bone pieces and surgical tools and you put them together. I remember I couldn’t quite use the clamp right. I was like, ‘Oh man, this is kind of awkward, my hands don’t fit in it.’ A Black male orthopedic surgeon said, ‘There’s not enough of you in this field, so you’d better learn how to use it.’ All I need is a challenge, so it was like, ‘Ding ding ding! I’m going to be an orthopedic surgeon.”

Q: What was your hand and upper extremities fellowship experience at UF like?

A: “After five years spent learning the foundation of orthopaedic surgery during residency at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, Texas, where I was the second Black person ever to train there in the program’s history, I knew I wanted to go into hand surgery. I was looking for somebody to teach me the art of it, somewhere I could have a one-on-one mentorship.

When I interviewed at UF with Paul C. Dell, M.D., I knew immediately that’s where I needed to be. He recognized that I was an individual. We became more than just fellow and mentor. I see him as an extension of my family. It was awesome, the best year of training by far.”

Q: How did you navigate challenges and discouragement in your education and career?

A: “There was a nurse who refused to call me doctor; he would say, ‘Hey Morehouse.’ Dr. Dell said in all 20 years he’d known the nurse, he had never not called one of his fellows doctor. He said, ‘Refer to her as doctor. That’s what she is.’ That was a really important moment. I’d had so many of those moments, people assuming I was the janitor or food service or the nurse, that I’d stopped correcting people. But for Dr. Dell to recognize there was a difference in treatment and then go a step further and stand up for me, that was the first time it had happened in my entire training, essentially a decade from the first time my undergraduate adviser told me I couldn’t get into medical school.

It’s changing now, but we don’t live in a utopia. In any field where you are going to be the only minority in the room, knowing that you belong isn’t enough. There are specific tools you need, and I’ve been blessed because of my intrinsic confidence.”

Q: What inspired you to write your book, “Yes, I Am the Surgeon: Lessons on Perseverance in a World That Tells You No,” about your experiences, and what impact has it had?

A: “Bob Ross had an intrinsic gift for painting, and yet he was able to teach people how to paint. That’s why I wrote the book — I want to teach people how to persevere.

When I was graduating from fellowship, I wrote a social media post that said, ‘Yes, I am a surgeon.’ It went viral, and I told myself I’d chronicle my story.

From the CEO of my company to the 12-year-old daughter of an orthopaedic surgeon, people of all ages have read the book and said it was eye-opening. I love that it is a genre that can potentially be read from middle school all the way through retirement.”

Q: How are you working to create mentorship opportunities and support for other women and minorities in medicine?

A: “I host Dr. Bilbrew’s Women in Medicine Brunch, an annual event with Grady Memorial Hospital, where I invite high school girls to listen to a panel of women physicians from different specialties share experiences on getting into medical school, what our specialties and work-life balance are like, whether we’re married or single, when to have kids. We have in-depth conversations with crying and laughing.

I’m also part of the executive board for the J. Robert Gladden Orthopaedic Society, which is the Black orthopaedic society. Mentorship there is huge. And people reach out to me on social media to shadow at my clinic.”

Q: You mentioned the importance of balance in your life and work. Can you share how you prioritize personal well-being and motherhood while managing the demands of a medical career?

A: “I have a second job called mommy to a 3-year-old boy, Washington. We go to music class and to the park and puppet shows and karate. That’s a huge part of my life, raising my child to be a valuable part of society and to be an emotionally intelligent Black man.

Outside of that, I love working out — strength training and heavy lifting. I’ve recognized how important it is for musculoskeletal health. I can’t tell my patients, ‘You need to walk, you need to lose weight,’ and then not do it myself.

Q: What’s next for you?

A: “I’m starting to write my next book, which is going to be on the confidence piece because you can’t persevere without confidence, right? As I reflect on my first book, I’m like, ‘Alright, Step 2.’ Here’s how you gain confidence for those who maybe don’t have it; here’s how you fake it you make it, until it’s real. It’s called, ‘Sometimes Wrong, Never In Doubt,’ which is a saying in the surgical field. To be a surgeon, you have to move forward with confidence, relying on your training, knowledge and experience. But it’s also essential to be humble and make sure you’re doing the right thing.”