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Flying Surgeon Loves To Give Back

M J Shenoy

When high-flying surgeon Ravindra Shah was recently promoted to brigadier general, the 60-year-old urologist wondered how much of meaning his life would have had if he had just remained in private practice.

"It would certainly benefited my family and myself," says Dr Shah, whose wife Manjula, is also a physician, "as it certainly has."

"But I would not have really given back something to a country that has been so wonderful to us -- and many other fellow Indians," mused Surat-born Dr Shah who came to America in the 1960s.

DR Shah, who is a senior flight surgeon with the United States Air Force with nearly 600 flight hours on the F-16, serves as the surgeon-general for Air National Guard units throughout New York state. At least 300 doctors, nurses and technicians are under his command. And he oversees the medical well-being of more than 6,000 members of the state's Air National Guard.

Juggling two careers -- as a highly respected doctor with a solid private practice and a flying surgeon -- comes naturally to him. "Everything depends on your passion and drive," he says.

"These pilots control planes which cost more than $ 25 million a piece," he says. "It is my job to keep them in top physical and mental condition."

His colleagues and superiors applaud his dedication and his willingness to be in top shape. Dealing with the pilots is like dealing with one's teenage children, Dr Shah feels.

"Many of these pilots are very young, energetic and aggressive people," he says. "They would not listen to you unless you are serious about what you do and you love doing it."

They don't respect you unless you set an example to them, he says. "This is indeed a very serious business."

Among the many serious things he had to do in recent years was to attend Kool School, a refresher course on an iceberg called Ruby in Greenland in the Arctic Circle. The temperatures were unusually cold, dipping to record lows of -40 and -60 degrees during his sojourn three years ago. He is also a graduate of the demanding 'Top Knife' fighter surgeon school.

Dr Shah, who became a private pilot 20 years ago and joined the National Guard two years later, believes in giving back to society, an ideal he and his wife have drilled into their two children, Monica and Neelesh.

While the two were studying at Brown University, the Shahs set up an endowment there to support a minority student with about $ 20,000 a year. Now, they are helping establish a chair of Indian studies at the university that could end up with a $ 5 million fund.

Education has been his passion from his college days in Gujarat, Dr Shah says, adding that his father, a Gandhian, imbued in him and the other members of the family, a profound sense of social responsibility.

"You better leave behind something other than a bank balance and money for your children," he says. "A moral and spiritual legacy certainly has more value than millions of dollars."

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