From patient to doctor

Recent grad Emma Gillian heads to med school, nine years after life-changing accident

By California State University, Bakersfield

February 10^th, 2023

Just one month after her 15th birthday, Emma Gillian was struck by a car walking home from softball practice, upending her life and paralyzing her left leg. Almost nine years of hard-earned recovery later, Gillian returned to the scene of the accident for the first time, walking once more and celebrating the first major step on her way to becoming a doctor.

Last fall, Gillian earned her bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from California State University, Bakersfield, and in July, she will start medical school at the Burrell College of Osteopathic Medicine in New Mexico. While the accident took away her chance at a normal high school experience, it sparked an interest in medicine, which in turn became a passion that’s fueled her.

“I had no interest going into medicine prior to my accident — none at all,” said Gillian, 24. Now, “I want to work with teens who have gone through medical trauma. I want to show them, ‘Hey, it’s bad now, but you can do it.’”

Gillian’s own experience of overcoming the odds to walk again would already be inspiration for young people with medical conditions of their own, but as a doctor, she will be able to do more than show recovery is possible — she’ll be able to help make it happen.

Emma Gillian is dressed in her graduation gown and sitting at the foot of the steps up to the Walter Stiern Library on the CSUB campus. Beside here are a stack of textbooks. Around her neck are several sashes and cords representing her accomplishments.

Emma Gillian stands at the foot of the steps leading up to the Walter Stiern Library. She is wearing her graduation cap and gown. Behind her is the wheelchair she used before regaining her ability to walk.

Road to recovery

In January 2014, Gillian was walking home from Liberty High School, still in cleats and with her softball bag slung over her shoulder. At a midblock crosswalk, cars stopped to let her and two nearby students cross. However, the driver of a Dodge Ram did not see the crosswalk and hit Gillian, knocking the cleats off her feet and sending her flying. Gillian’s split-second instinct to try to jump out of the truck’s way might have saved her life, as the vehicle struck her pelvis instead of her head.

In and out of consciousness, Gillian asked the paramedics to take her to Adventist Health, where her stepfather was an emergency room physician. Though they took her to Kern Medical instead, the doctors there did let her stepfather in to see her before she was intubated. A few days later, Gillian awoke from a coma with rods holding her pelvis together.

“All I wanted was to see my friends, and my mom somehow finagled it so that my friend could come,” Gillian recalled. “The first thing she said to me was, ‘So. You got hit by a truck.’ And I had wires coming out of me, and I couldn’t laugh because I had been intubated, but I just started cackling. From that point on, humor was how I dealt with it.”

Good spirits would prove essential for recovery from her long list of injuries: seven broken ribs, a shattered pelvis, a hernia, three crushed nerves and three nerves pulled from the root. Following her month-long stay at Kern Medical and a three-week stint at a local rehabilitation center, Gillian went to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, where doctors diagnosed the nerve severance that they said would likely paralyze the leg forever.

Little by little, Gillian learned how to walk again, even as her leg remained partially paralyzed. She began walking in 2019 and was able to walk full-time by fall 2021. She explained the paralysis as being able to pull her leg back to kick a soccer ball but not follow through to actually kick it.

Her mother, Misty Franklin, initially worried Gillian’s tenacity toward recovery was just teenage naiveite in the face of a life-altering event. As time passed, she realized that undaunted spirit is just who her daughter is.

“Watching Emma persevere through so many struggles and pain and her sheer will to refuse to succumb to the odds reminds me that the struggles I had with her as a strong-willed toddler weren’t in vain,” Franklin said. “She has always been fiercely independent, competitive and stubborn. Those character traits ended up serving her very well.”

Throughout her time at Kern Medical, Gillian’s interest in her care went beyond just wanting to know if she would be OK or — a very important question for the then-15-year-old — if she’d be able to drive. She also wanted to know why doctors did the specific things they did and what exactly was going on in her body.

This was perhaps a natural response for Gillian, who said she was always the “Why Kid” growing up, wanting answers to all of life’s questions and usually finding them in science. Her mother is a science teacher and would tell her that science is real-world magic. Though the love of science broadly was there, it was Gillian’s experience as a patient that piqued her interest in the medical field.

“The best gift I can give to my providers, the best thank-you I can do, is taking the life that they saved and saving other lives,” she said. “Then they can know the life they saved in turn saved these lives.”

An older photo of Emma in the hospital, sitting in a wheelchair with a pillow behind her neck. Her friend is sitting on the floor next to her wheelchair.

An older photo of Emma in a hospital bed. Stretched across her bed is a large

Emma takes a selfie in the hospital, hair wrapped in a towel and hospital gown visible. Over her shoulder, her mother is smiling and lying in the hospital bed.

Finding her way

Since Gillian couldn’t return to school in-person while she recovered, she began to resume her sophomore year Honors classes at home but found it wasn’t working for her. Instead, she took the California High School Proficiency Exam in April 2015 and started at CSUB that fall.

Though Gillian’s desire to become a doctor quickly followed her accident, the path forward did not initially seem possible. As a physician, her stepfather knew well the physical, mental and emotional stress med school requires, Franklin said, and they weren’t sure Gillian’s health would allow her to endure it.

“There was never any question that the kid was capable, certainly academically, of achieving that goal, but we weren't sure what her longevity would be in such a demanding field. We still don't have that answer, of course,” Franklin said. “But how do you tell a kid that has such a big dream that you shouldn't pursue it? You don't. You support her and prepare her the best you can.”

After a tough-love discussion with her stepfather, Gillian opted for a computer science major. She soon found the subject wasn’t for her but kept pursuing it, not minding the C’s she was getting.

The prospect of a second professional internship with the Walt Disney Company forced her to work on bringing up her 2.9 GPA. Despite not getting the internship she hoped for, the experience flipped a switch for Gillian, who decided to throw herself completely into her studies, this time with the major that was right for her.

“I got an A in chemistry, and I fell in love with it,” she said. “I just went ‘I’m going to pursue it with all my passion.’”

A biochemistry major on a pre-med track will have plenty of hurdles to overcome, but for Gillian there was another: not all of her classrooms were accessible for her wheelchair, which she was still using early on in her switch to biochemistry. She was told she was the first student with accessibility needs in the department but found faculty were eager to accommodate.

“I felt supported, helped and encouraged in everything I did,” Gillian said. “I’m very proud to have come from that department.”

Among those who stood out for Gillian were department faculty members Drs. Karlo Lopez, Sarah Forester, Danielle Solano, Jesse Bergkamp and Marina Shapiro, along with biology lecturer Dr. Robert Stark.

“I’m very grateful to have gotten the opportunity to get advice from these people,” Gillian said. “I think that’s why I like CSUB’s chem department so much, because we’re so small that you can really make a big impact. They’re all so amazing and so sweet, but those ones made me feel like I could do whatever I wanted to pursue.”

Dr. Lopez — interim associate dean of CSUB’s School of Natural Sciences, Mathematics and Engineering — was especially helpful with getting Gillian on track for med school, she said.

“Emma was certainly a hard worker who overcame a very difficult situation,” Dr. Lopez said. “In her studies, she never let what happened to her define her and she continued reaching for her goal. We have had many frank discussions on what the road ahead looks like, and I have no doubt she will persevere.”

In addition to classes, Gillian kept busy with significant involvement on campus: research on with Dr. Shapiro, working with underclass students as a pathways program mentor and high school students as a student ambassador for CSUB’s Outreach and Recruitment department, participating in the COPE Health Scholars program and serving as vice presidents of two clubs, multiple roles within the Phi Sigma Sigma sorority and director of student support for Associated Students, Inc.

“I don’t think it was until a couple years after the accident that I realized I didn’t really get a high school experience. I think I overcompensated by being extremely involved on campus at CSUB,” she said with a laugh.

Outside the CSUB student union, Emma takes a photo with CSUB President Zelezny. Emma is still using her wheelchair at this point. Another student is also in the photo. They are all giving the `Roadrunner hand signal.

On campus in DDH, Emma smiles for a photo with four of her Phi Sigma Sigma Sorority sisters. They are all dressed for Halloween, as are the people in the background behind them. Emma is sitting in her wheelchair.

Emma works in a lab on campus, wearing safety goggles. She is sitting at a table, her wheelchair just in view.

Becoming an empathetic physician

With five months left until she starts medical school, Gillian is finding herself with more free time than she’s had in the last few years. She’s enjoying it while she can, knowing the next phase of her education will keep her busier than ever. Still, she wants to make the most of her time, with upcoming travel plans, mentoring pre-med students and a job scribing at Priority Urgent Care.

After years of buildup ahead of medical school, Gillian is finding it hard to believe that’s she reached the first milestone and is onto the next chapter. She knows the hard work is only just beginning but will draw on her personal medical experience to power through any obstacles.

“There’s not really a lot of disability talk in health care because people want their physicians to be the prime example of health,” Gillian said. “But I always talk about how we need more people with chronic illnesses in medicine because how can you advocate for someone with a chronic illness if you don’t understand? Those are the people who are going to advocate for the patients the best.”

Franklin believes her daughter, a natural caregiver, would have made a great doctor no matter what, but the harrowing experience they went through means Gillian will bring a special perspective to her profession.

“To have this background as a patient will serve her own patients in a way that very few doctors could offer,” Franklin said. “She has an insight that will allow her to consider an entirely different facet of need for her patients in determining their care and treatment plan. She will treat the patient as a whole with knowledge, love and empathy like no other.”

As she moves on with her education and eventually her career, Gillian will remember CSUB and all the people who made her time there special.

“All stories are different, and going to CSUB has allowed me to experience a lot of these stories,” she said. “I think it has prepared me to become an empathetic, understanding physician. It has made me want to become a mentor as well. I plan on mentoring for the rest of my life, and I don’t think that would have happened anywhere else.”