SEO: Kayleen Bailey works to fight cancer for her mother

Kayleen Bailey, Tulane Medical School alumna has overcome much heartache in her life,
including losing her mother while in college to cancer. Bailey decided to change path and
became a doctor and helping children with cancer.

Doctor credits her mother for career choice

Kayleen Bailey helps others going through similar experience as her mother
The sounds of a hospital surround her: the beeping of machines, the hustling of
feet, the barking of orders and the ringing of alarms. It can sound overwhelming,
intimidating and even frightening, yet Kayleen Bailey stands calmly in the middle of it
all. Bailey is in the middle of working yet another 12-hour shift, a typical weekend for
her and in the inside of all this chaos, she thinks about the events that lead her to this
moment in life.
While many credit the influence of a particular teacher or the support of loving
parents for their success as a physician, Bailey, 29, credits her mothers death as the thing
that turned her toward medicine.
Early life
Kayleen Bailey was born and raised in Baltimore, surrounded by friends and
family. Bailey attended private Catholic school and is the oldest of three children. She
attended Franklin and Marshall College to study French and also to play volleyball.
Bailey adores her family and describes her family as people who dont expect anything
from me besides love.
Bailey attended Franklin and Marshall with the hopes of
becoming a college professor. This brought her to her summer
internship at John Hopkins Hospital to do research.
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Kayleen Bailey with her mother,

Mary- Kay Bailey.
Photo Courtesy: Mark Bailey

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Hopkins internship that changed everything
Bailey began her Hopkins internship thinking she would get experience in a
research setting. During Baileys internship, her mother was diagnosed with stomach
cancer, which had spread throughout her entire body. She was given only six weeks to
live. Bailey did not know how to handle her mothers diagnosis. Bailey said she went
where she was most comfortable, and went to my books and research. Her mentor, Dr.
Susan Carraway, however, had different plans for her.
Dr. Carraway pried her away from the books and pushed her out to the oncology
hospital floors to work with the patients and the doctors. Dr. Carraway thought that
because of her mother, working with patients and families going through similar
situations might help Bailey. Bailey met the oncologists and found them to be the nicest
people in the world.
Finding her calling
At first, Bailey was skeptical about working with the patients, thinking it might
make things harder for her emotionally. Seeing the patients in the hospital struggling the
way her mother did was hard for Bailey. The longer she worked with the patients,
however, she saw that it helped her to help those going through similar situations. I
began to realize I belonged with the patients and the doctors more than in the lab or in my
books doing research, said Bailey.

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One patient stood out to Bailey. The patient came in for an appointment with Dr.
Carraway and Bailey was asked to assist. The patient had leukemia and was struggling
with it. At the end of the visit, she turned to Carraway and said, When I come in to see
you I forget I have leukemia. It was a defining moment for Bailey. It changed
everything for me.
Shortly after, Baileys mother died from cancer. Bailey knew
then that she not only wanted to be a doctor, but oncology was her

It was my
mom that
changed
everything for
me.

calling.
Her mothers influence
Just a few short months after her mother died, Bailey had to talk over and over
again about the experience and its influence over her in her medical school interviews. It
was hard, but also therapeutic. It helped me talk about her and remember her, Bailey
said.
Slowing down
Becoming a doctor has changed Bailey, but not in a way you would expect. You
would think becoming a doctor makes you speed up, go faster or
get things done, but in fact, it has slowed her down. I always
wanted to be the first one with my hand up, the first one to finish
something, but becoming a physician forces you to slow down and
develop patience, she says.
Kayleen Bailey after getting
off a long day at work.
Photo Courtesy: Kayleen
Bailey

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I needed to learn to spend the time and ask enough questions, Bailey said. She
has translated this into her everyday life and is no longer stressed about a long line in the
grocery store.
Standing in the middle of the hospital with hurt feet, lack of sleep and chaos all
around her, Bailey cant think of anywhere else she would rather be. All of those people
and life events picked her up and placed her exactly where she belongs.

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Finding Love in Medical School

Kayleen Bailey changes from scrubs to a wedding dress
As she walked the streets of New Orleans one warm Sunday afternoon, Kayleen
Bailey realized this was where she wanted to go to medical school. Locals were dressed
in black and gold for the upcoming Saints game and the city, looking so different from
her Baltimore home, looked beautiful to her. Little did she know shed not only get her
first choices school, but find her future husband there.
Nothing is guaranteed when you are applying to medical school and she
interviewed at three schools. In the end, she found her way to the heart of the south to
study medicine.
The first week of medical school, Bailey ran for secretary of her class, while
another student from the northeast, Erik Romanelli, ran for president. They talked only
once in passing and they knew very little about each
other. They knew so little, in fact, that they didnt
vote for each other. Both got elected to their
prospective offices, however, and they were forced to
get to know each other, something Bailey describes as
fate. Within a month they were dating. Five years
later, they married.

Kayleen and Erik Romanelli

at wedding after finding
each other at medical
school.
Photo courtesy: Shawn

Romanelli describes them having a great dynamic together in office and were
both re-elected all four years of medical school. Likewise, they dated for the same four
years and they married on June 7, 2014. It was cool because we both shared ambitions
of being a class officer, but would have never guessed in that process that wed meet the
person we would eventually marry, said Bailey.

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They both now work as physicians at Einstein Medical Center in New York.
When they look back at their choices of both medical schools and elected offices, Bailey
says, Surviving medical school and elected office together taught us we could survive
anything, including marriage.

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