Herman Bagga
Herman Bagga was 17 and still in high school in Erie, Pennsylvania when his father gave him the opportunity to open a branch of the family’s retail chain. “It was my dad’s way of seeing if I could run the business, and it worked out,” says the 25-year-old medical student. His success selling wicker and rattan imports drove him into an economics program at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. But Bagga soon found that he was much more stimulated by the sciences.
Since starting medical school at Johns Hopkins, he has not been disappointed. “Every day is basically a reward,” he says. “In no other field will people open up themselves to you like they do in medicine. It’s an incredible privilege.” He says being a Sikh puts a special responsibility on him because he may be the only member of his group an outsider meets. He also says that he views wearing a turban as an advantage because it makes him easy to remember.
At Hopkins, he decided to specialize in urology because, he says, the doctors at the Brady Urological Institute “really took me in with open arms, and they were funny as hell.” But medical school is not without its challenges. “I’m very close to my family, and it’s sort of through their sacrifices that I’m here,” he says. “I know they want to see me more, and I feel bad that I’m not able to give that to them.” Once he’s finished with med school, Bagga is heading to the University of California, San Francisco for his residency. Those close to him feel good about his decision. “They say it’s the perfect place for me.”
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