He’s Having a Ball in His Second Career
ABR volunteer Mark Hamilton, MD, occupies a thin sliver on the Venn diagram of unique careers.
A former professional baseball player, Dr. Hamilton is now an abdominal imaging fellow at NYU Langone Health in Manhattan. With a grandfather who played professional basketball and a father who is a physician, he was interested in both tracks as a child.
“I wanted to do what my grandfather and father did,” Dr. Hamilton said. “Thankfully, my dad was an advocate and told me from a very young age that I could do both.”
Having two career paths helped when he graduated from high school in Texas. Considered a strong candidate to be an early pick in baseball’s Major League Draft, he met with 25 of the 30 teams to share his asking price to forgo college. When he didn’t receive the commitment he wanted, Dr. Hamilton accepted a scholarship to play at Tulane University.
“I set a price tag on what my college experience meant to me, knowing that I wanted to potentially pursue medicine,” he said. “I went to Tulane largely because it has quality academics. That was one of my priorities during my recruiting visits.”
After three years at Tulane, including a junior season when he was named an All-American player, Dr. Hamilton was chosen in the second round of the draft by the St. Louis Cardinals in 2006. He said his time in college made him better pro material.
“I grew up physically and mentally, and it gave me a leg up to go into professional sports with a different mindset than I would’ve had if I had come straight out of high school,” he said. “It was definitely time well spent.”
Although he played much of his career in the minor leagues, Dr. Hamilton spent about half of the 2011 season with the Cardinals, a year they won the World Series over the Texas Rangers.
Sharing a clubhouse with stars like Lance Berkman, Yadier Molina, and Albert Pujols and watching the professional way they prepared was a learning opportunity.
“What really rubbed off on me for my medical career is that I want to be somebody who is reliable, accountable, and available,” Dr. Hamilton said. “In the future, I want to be an expert in my field and bring something that is important both to the clinicians I’m working with and the patients whose images I’m reading.”
A National Institutes of Health report found that a big-league baseball career typically lasts 5.6 years. Dr. Hamilton faced a decision when he was released by the Atlanta Braves in 2014 after nine years in the pro game: Go back to the Mexican League where he had played during the previous offseason or return to Tulane to finish his degree in neuroscience. After discussions with his wife, Dr. Hamilton was sitting in an organic chemistry class one week after his final at bat.
“That enabled me to keep a level head and stay pragmatic,” he said. “If there had been an extended period between ending my baseball career and school starting, maybe I would’ve felt more indecisive.”
Dr. Hamilton’s father, Stanley, was a physician at Johns Hopkins and later served as the head of pathology and laboratory medicine at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston and City of Hope in Los Angeles. Watching and talking with his father was an inspiration for Dr. Hamilton, who earned his medical degree from the Hofstra Northwell School of Medicine, and completed a residency at Northwell Health.
“He did the microscope version of what I’m doing on a screen,” he said. “They’re both diagnostic fields. What drove me into this field was seeing my dad’s ability to impact patients. In my case, I believe that radiology is the central hub where all the trains go through.”
Dr. Hamilton is serving his profession in many ways, including as a member of the ABR Diagnostic Radiology Initial Certification Advisory Committee. When he and the group met at ABR headquarters in Tucson for two days in February, Committee Chair Desiree Morgan, MD, said he showed a sharp knowledge and interest in his specialty board, especially as a new member of the advisory group.
“His perspectives on the ABR were spot on,” said Dr. Morgan, who’s also a member of the ABR Board of Governors. “After a few presentations and group discussions, I asked all the meeting attendees to tell me in their own words, ‘What is the ABR?’ and he said, ‘The ABR represents a group of volunteers, staff, and experts dedicated to creating and maintaining certifying exams and materials to ensure that radiologists are safe and competent to practice in a specific discipline.’”
While he valued his time playing baseball, Dr. Hamilton is focused on his work in medicine. He’s happy to have a backup plan.
“Having two careers like this, when you look in the rearview, it’s pretty amazing,” he said. “I feel incredibly blessed to have had the opportunity to pursue both.”
