On May 7 Heinz, who grew up in the Detroit area, was among the members of the graduating class of 2016 at the Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine. With D.O. degree in hand, he’s moving on to a residency in family medicine at OhioHealth Riverside Hospital in Columbus.
Though flying big planes for Delta Connection had in some ways been his dream job, when Heinz one day realized he would rather be a primary care physician than a pilot, he didn’t agonize over making a big aerial U-turn.
“I just sent in my two-week notice,” he recalled. “I didn’t think about it for months and months; I just did it.”
This is all the more remarkable because Heinz had yearned to be a commercial pilot since his boyhood days. His father, who worked in auto industry sales, had often let him tag along on globetrotting business trips.
”I was in Japan when I was eight years old,” he said. “He went to Europe and Asia and all over. And I fell in love with aviation. From the time I was a kid, I never wanted to do anything else but be an airline pilot.”
After earning a degree in aviation flight science from Western Michigan University, Heinz signed on with Delta Connection in 2007. He loved the flying, but he began to think about other possibilities as the U.S. airline industry continued to face serious economic troubles, and he started to realize that the lifestyle of an airline pilot can make eating healthy and getting regular exercise a challenge. He also discovered a career option that excited him just as much as piloting.
As luck would have it, Heinz has a cousin who at that time was starting a radiology residency in Dayton, Ohio, after graduating from Midwestern University’s Chicago College of Osteopathic Medicine.
“She was kind of a major influence,” he recalled. “I’d always been interested in nutrition and health, and I just loved hearing about her medical school journey and residency. And I realized that if there was anything else in the entire world that would make me happy, other than being a pilot, it was being a doctor.”
Having quit his pilot’s job, Heinz faced the task of earning the academic requirements for medical school from scratch – and without an income. He packed in a year of pre-med courses at Cincinnati’s Xavier University and also found time for the accelerated MBA course at Miami University of Ohio.
“I had to take all the physics, the chemistry, the biology, and the MCAT prep courses, everything,” he remembered. “And doing that without a salary was kind of a challenge! But I had a pretty nice little retirement account started with the airline, and I was able to draw on that.”
Though he had some catching up to do on the schooling side, Heinz also entered medical school with the kind of steady hand that comes from sailing passengers through the skies in a large winged rocket.
“In his first and second years, he brought a lot of poise and maturity and thoughtfulness to the CBL (case-based learning) group and to all our interactions,” said Katy Kropf, D.O., an assistant professor of family medicine at the Heritage College.
Executive Dean Kenneth H. Johnson, D.O., said Heinz’s less-than-typical background for a medical student was not a barrier to acceptance at the Heritage College.
“During all our 40 years of existence, one of this college’s great strengths has been our willingness to welcome students from all kinds of nontraditional backgrounds, as long as they show the commitment and the potential to become competent, caring osteopathic physicians,” Johnson said. “And as it happens, one of the members of our very first incoming class, back in 1976, started school as a 33-year-old former military pilot.”
Like about half of all Heritage College graduates, Heinz plans to practice primary care medicine. “I’m excited about it,” he said. “I know it’s not for everyone, but it’s kind of been on the radar from day one for me. I love primary care – it’s just so seriously needed, and I’m going to be pretty excited to do it.”
Still, Heinz hasn’t lost his love for aviation and has kept up his certification as an instructor. “I definitely miss flying, but I don’t miss the lifestyle of being an airline pilot,” he explained. “I definitely hope to get back into general aviation as a hobby once I’m in a more comfortable situation financially.”
And if, like many Heritage College-trained physicians, he ends up working in a medically underserved area, who knows? Having a plane and knowing how to fly it might help him serve patients in remote locations.
“That’s really a great idea, and I’ve kind of rolled that idea around,” he admitted. “It would be pretty neat.”
Story and photo courtesy of Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine.