Karen Nelson walked into her kindergarten classroom decked out in her nurse cousin’s scrubs, a bonnet and booties and a Fisher-Price plastic stethoscope hanging around her neck. It was Career Day, and Nelson had no doubts about what she was going to be – a surgeon.

Several decades later, Nelson regularly walks into the operating room in the same garb, except the scrubs are her own and her stethoscope is no longer manufactured by a toy company.

Dr. Nelson is joining Drs. Paul Moore and Randy Carter Jr. as the newest member of Med Center Health’s cardiothoracic surgical team, which focuses on the heart, lungs and chest.

“I have always enjoyed taking care of people,” she said. “It sounds kind of weird, but I’ve enjoyed seeing people who might have been sick get better.”

After doing her undergrad work in Georgia, medical school in Pennsylvania and general surgery residency just north of Detroit, Nelson worked at Ohio and Wisconsin hospitals. Now, she’s coming the closest to home she’s been since graduating from high school in Henderson, where her family lives.

She said she hopes to have a “long, satisfying career” in Bowling Green like Moore and Carter, who have been at Med Center Health for 25 and 27 years, respectively.

While training at Ohio State and Cleveland Clinic, Nelson found her niche in minimally invasive surgeries. While Med Center Health already offers such surgeries, she wants to make them less or non-invasive by making smaller incisions that don’t require splitting a patient’s sternum.

This method leads to dramatically shorter recovery times; Nelson said one patient she saw during her training ran a marathon two weeks after her minimally-invasive heart surgery.

But the case that convinced her to pursue her current path belonged to her general surgery residency mentor.

“I saw a patient in his clinic that was struggling to breathe, huffing and puffing because the aortic valve was so narrowed,” Nelson said. “He wasn’t generating enough blood flow to the rest of his body and his lungs. He was tired all the time. But when I saw that surgery after the valve was replaced, and he’s walking in the hallways after surgery, literally the next day, I was like, that’s awesome. This is what I want to do.”

As a female cardiothoracic surgeon, Nelson has been called a “unicorn” before. She’s not sure how to feel about that label, but she is sure that women interested in the medical field need more encouragement.

Throughout her education and training, Nelson was underestimated, but persisted partially thanks to two male mentors who encouraged her to continue. So when she sees another female surgeon, there is an “automatic camaraderie,” she said.

“I know what she had to go through to get there,” Nelson said. “Whenever I’m told that a young lady is interested in medicine, or is interested in surgery, I’m super excited and I want to talk to them. I invite them into my OR if they want to come because we have to get people excited early.”

The need for physicians isn’t limited to women.

A 2021 Mayo Clinic study found that 20% of physicians planned to retire or leave the field in the following two years, largely because of pandemic stress and concerns. This aging out of the baby boomer generation comes as people’s life expectancies are rising.

“It’s great that we’re living longer, but that means we need people to take care of them,” Nelson said.

For her, the key to recruiting the next generation of physicians, nurses and others in the medical field is sharing her passion with them. If prospective physicians see that Nelson’s excited about her job, and get some encouragement from her, they’re more likely to continue pursing a career in medicine, she said.

As a teaching hospital, Med Center Health is the perfect place for Nelson to be the mentor that others were for her.

“I love to teach. I’m so excited to be here,” she said. “I had two phenomenal surgeons inspire me and encourage me. Some of them just need the little confidence boost or spark – you know, ‘Hey, you can do this.’ ”

– Follow reporter Sarah Michels on Twitter @sarah_michels13 or visit bgdailynews.com.