Priel Schmalbach Memorial Scholarship Fund
In honor of the upcoming birthday (Oct 9th) of Priel Schmalbach, MD, Ph.D., we have set up this fundraiser to contribute to the Memorial Scholarship fund with the Irvine School of Medicine. The Priel Schmalbach Memorial Scholarship Fund provides an annual award to a UCI Medical Student to support an enrichment experience outside the regular medical school curriculum that will contribute to making that student a more patient-focused physician. Priel continues to inspire many to this day, and we hope this scholarship will continue this legacy.
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Priel was a vibrant member of the UCI community during his time in the Medical Scientist Training Program, completing his Ph.D. in 2014 and his MD in 2016. During his doctoral studies, he was supported by a TL1 Fellowship from the Institute for Clinical and Translational Science. In addition to being a dedicated and talented scholar, Priel was a compassionate and joyful human being, and was actively engaged in campus life, from teaching yoga at the ARC to co-founding Students for Integrative Medicine at UCI. Despite the rigors of graduate school, he managed to take full advantage of the extracurricular opportunities in Southern California. He was a regular visitor to Coachella and to Joshua Tree, where he loved to go bouldering.
Priel grew up on a 5 acre fruit tree grove and fish farm in Florida, and could often be seen around UCI harvesting fruit from the trees that grow on campus. He entered medical school with the intention of becoming a primary care physician, but during his emergency medicine rotation he discovered a passion for the daily challenges and fast pace of that environment, and so he decided to become an emergency medicine physician. Priel was in his third year of a residency in Emergency Medicine at the combined North Shore-Long Island Jewish Medical Center Emergency Medicine Program, part of the Northwell Hospital System. He was going on to do a fellowship in ultrasound, which had always been an interest of his. He had just gotten married to Morgan Morillo on October 6th. They were on their honeymoon in Thailand when he had an accident while rock climbing. This memorial fund is being established to honor Priel’s dedication to delivering medical care to the whole person with a full awareness and consideration of the lifestyle and other contextual factors that shape personal health.
To get a sense of the person that Priel was, you can view the following video:
