Inheriting the values of a profession.

win a spot in Mass General’s surgical residency. As a resident in surgery and later a fellow in cardiac surgery, he was known to arrive at 3 AM to prepare for his clinical responsibilities. Even decades later, his contemporaries---many of them now senior surgical staff at Mass General---still speak of how he always prioritized the care of the patient, and how he never left work unfinished for his colleagues. As students, we came to learn that no obstacle, medical or personal, ever drove Dr McCabe to feel sorry for himself. Feeling sorry was not an option, because feeling sorry would not help any patients, and feeling sorry would not make his multiple sclerosis fade. Thus, he possessed a quintessential doctor’s skill---the ability to look reality straight in the eye, and then confront that reality with decisiveness. His humility meant that he never underestimated the difficulties in confronting the realities of medical training and clinical care. He told us a story about trying to spend time with his daughter and wife at the beach during a precious day off in surgical residency. Exhausted and sleep-deprived, he fell asleep behind a sand dune, and his wife could not find him for hours. While reiterating the significance of doctors’ obligations to patients, he also acknowledged that the personal challenges in fulfilling those obligations would be tremendous. He was able to express both the absolute importance of confronting challenges while never minimizing the difficulties those tasks entailed.