Louisville Medicine Volume 66, Issue 11 | Page 32

MEMBERS DR. Who MEMBER SPOTLIGHT AMY QUILLO, MD Aaron Burch T here are a couple of tells which tip off the non-native Louisvillian when they’re talking to a Louisville “born- n-bred.” First, Louisvillians are more likely to claim a neighborhood. Early in her interview, Dr. Amy Quillo explained that she grew up in Middletown but regularly visited the Highlands to see friends. The next tell: she owned her sports fandom. Born into a UofL family, Dr. Quillo still regularly attends games with family and friends. Even though she attended UK for undergraduate studies (while Rick Pitino was coach, no less), her loyalty has never wavered. Perhaps most interestingly, Louisville natives tend to be relaxed and open about themselves and their history. Dr. Quillo spoke fondly of attending St. Margaret Mary School for her elementary years and Sacred Heart for high school. She’s the oldest of four siblings, all younger brothers. “I was kind of a nerd. I was on the math team; I loved to read. When I was in high school, I got really into local music and coffee. I was constantly trying to get rides to the Highlands. My mom was so excited when I got my license and could stop asking her,” she smiled. Dr. Quillo had a grandfather who practiced dentistry, but her medical career happened by accident. She had been studying chem- ical engineering for several years before a year abroad pushed her out of her comfort zone. It began with a crash course of intensive language training in a castle near Heidelberg, Germany. “We stayed in the castle for a month and a half before moving down to the city. I got really comfortable with the German language, partly because I worked in an Irish pub and waited on people from so many different countries. It was really hard but so much fun,” she happily explained. “One of my flatmates was in medical school in France. He was talking about medicine all the time and was so passionate about it. I remember being asked what I liked about chemical engineering, and I didn’t have a good answer. I said to myself, ‘Gosh, now that I think about it, what am I doing?’” 30 LOUISVILLE MEDICINE She would soon return to the Bluegrass and finish two bachelor’s degrees in Chemistry and German, but Dr. Quillo had an inkling that medicine was her future. She took the MCAT and never looked back. As is often the case, chosen specialties are the ones least expected. Dr. Quillo was initially certain she had no interest in surgery, but her early third-year rotation changed her mind in a hurry. “It was my first rotation, so at first I thought I had just been sick of the classroom, but the days in the OR went by so fast. Some other specialties were interesting, but I kept coming back around to surgery.” Newly married to Nathan Quillo, Dr. Quillo began her residency in 2004. Although she interviewed in several cities, it wasn’t hard to stay home, especially when the UofL surgery program was and remains well regarded. “If I’m going to spend five years of my life learning a skill, I want to be able to do it well when I finish. The Louisville program is hard, but you know what you’re getting out of it,” she said. “There were no restrictions on resident hours at that point, so my poor husband was now married to someone working sometimes 120 hours per week. He’d heard me talk about becoming a surgeon for a long time and supported me the whole way, which was really helpful for my work-life balance.” Through her physician mentors, Drs. Mike Flynn and Richard Goldstein, Dr. Quillo became interested in endocrine surgery, a newer subspecialty focusing mainly on thyroid and parathyroid surgery. “I did a rotation with them early in my residency, and I was really intrigued by the work they did. Thyroid surgery is a little different each time. It’s an intricate, delicate surgery, and the vocal cord nerves are at risk. I look at it as a challenging puzzle, and the work up with the patients is a little bit more involved as well.” During her fourth year of residency, Dr. Quillo gave birth to a son, Henry. She worked tirelessly up until the due date. The delivery went perfectly, and Henry is currently finishing fifth grade. With her residency complete, the family moved to Minnesota for a year so Dr. Quillo could complete an endocrine surgery fel-