May 2, 2024

Living the dream with author and former Chief Of Surgery Dr. Salvador Forcina

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The Odyssey of an American Doctor: Step into the remarkable life of Dr. Salvador Forcina, whose path took him from the ruins of World War II Italy to the forefront of American medicine. In this compelling episode of 'Living the Dream with Curveball,' Dr. Forcina shares the trials and triumphs that led to his esteemed career as a surgeon and his role as a chief of surgery at two North Jersey Shore hospitals. His tale is a testament to the enduring spirit of determination and hard work.

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> Speaker A>Welcome, um, to the Living the dream podcast with curveball. Um, if you believe you can achieve.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Chee Chee.

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> Speaker C>Welcome to the Living a dream with Curveball podcast, a show where I interviewed guests that teach, motivate and inspire.

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> Speaker C>Today I am joined by Arthur, vascular and trauma surgeon, as well as retired general doctor Salvador Ficina. Doctor Ficina is going to be sharing his story about how he came from war torn Italy to the US to become one of the most respected doctors in the United States.

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> Speaker C>So, doctor Ficina, thank you so much for joining me today.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Thank you. Thank you for having me. Thank you.

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> Speaker C>Why don't you start off by telling everybody a little bit about yourself?

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Well, I just turned, um, 83. I was born in Italy during the war, in world War two in Scourge is located between Roman Naples and the Mediterranean Sea.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And that area suffered tremendous devastation, um, during the war. So, as a consequence, uh, my father lost his brother during the war.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>His grandfather was german prisoner, and, uh, so that cause very psychologically caused tremendous pain to the family.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>So he decided in 1949 for us to go to almost at the end of the war, at that time to migrate to Argentina. He was a worker in Argentina. Life was not easy for an immigrant at that time. However, at least he thought that was better for, uh, me and my brother to give us a future and we will stay away from the war.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And so I studied in Argentina, I became a doctor in Argentina, and after, uh, and I spent 20 years in Argentina, life was not easy for me there. My parents were workers, were simple people, and.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>But what happened was I had the advantage of having a family, a father and a mother. They were very supportive in a simple way, and they encouraged me.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And my father, when I was a child, I, uh, was no special child. I was just like anybody else, liked to play in the street in a, uh, dirty road, kicking an improvised ball made with a sock.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And, um, so for some reason, I didn't want to study, and that was my, my father was very frustrated about that. But everything changed one day when the priests that were in one of the churches close by showed me some pictures about the college and where the kids had some activity like swimming in the pool, they have a horse, they were playing football, etcetera. Uh, so that motivated me anyhow. I went to the school in Buenos Aires. I spent seven years, was very rigid. School was very hard for me. I remember the school changed my personality because I was very, uh, when I went there, I was not a wild child, but, you know, I was, uh, I didn't have the discipline. I was eleven years old and I saw my parents once a year. I was separated from my parents since eleven years old and that psychologically the separation from my mother affected me.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And uh, so it was very difficult for me to in the beginning, but eventually, gradually I started to see other boys that were applying themselves and, and I start to understand what my father used to say, that you had to work hard and you had to apply, uh, yourself to accomplish something in life. And eventually, sooner or later it took time, sooner or later that came through me and then, and uh, it was good for me. So like I said, after 20 years I studied Argentina.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>I went back to Italy and I was going to specialize in Italy. But scouring when my parents used to live, it's a summer resort. I was there waiting until September to take some exams and I met distal member of my family in America, here in United States. And they convinced me that they to come to United States because whatever and really reasoning there was not too much for me difference between Argentina and Italy. So I came to this country and it was really uh.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>I admire when I came to this country and I saw this country was something new for me. And then I thought at that time that this was the promised land I was looking for and I knew nothing was going to be easy. But if I apply myself and I work very hard, I could accomplish something in this country. And it, um, was not easy in the beginning because I didn't speak English, my title, I was an MD. I was not recognized here. I had to take exams and I never saw multiple choices exam in my life. So anyhow, to make a long story short, I had to take courses and uh, I had the money, my family had to help me out, borrow money.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Eventually I passed the exam and I started my training in general surgery and vascular trauma.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And I did that for five years.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And here we are.

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> Speaker C>Absolutely. And you also served as the chief of surgery for two north Jersey Shore hospitals. So kind of tell us about that, what that was like.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Yes, well, you know, I have a good training and I applied myself. I was very serious and I ended up being a chief, uh, of surgeon to hospital, holy name hospital in teenage and uh, Maryland Hospital in Secaucus, New Jersey, northern New Jersey, just uh, a few miles from New York. And um, so it was uh, a lot of responsibility and I was very proud of have accomplished something. And so that was uh, really a dream for me because being nobody in Argentina, I was nobody. I was an immigrant in Argentina, but immigrant in Argentina at that time, you were. Nobody is no immigrant. Being in United States today.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>It's not. You are on your own.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And, and what happened was with me was that I had to take too many paths, but the wrong path, the wrong direction, because I didn't have nobody that guide me and nobody told me, do this, do that, don't do this. I had to make, uh, many, um, wrong choices and I had to correct that, unfortunately. But I had more than one occasion I was ready to quit. But remembering seeing the example from my parents that worked very hard.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And uh, so my parents were in Argentina for 30 years. In Italy, during the war, they lost everything. When, uh, they went to Argentina. They were young and they worked very hard for 30 years. And wherever they had saved the revolution came, the inflation came.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And again, after ten years, they lost everything and they were back to zero.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>But, you know, they never quit. And so seeing that example of uh, my parents, uh, I don't need words. Just looking at them and their daily life and their leg.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>So encouraged me for me to try to be somebody in life.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>I was like in a hole, try to get out of that hole. And that was the example I got for my parents. And I thank them.

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> Speaker C>Well, how do you feel that Italy, where you came from, is different now than it was when you were born and grew up there?

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Yeah. Well, Italy today is, uh, the big changes, of course, because, you know, the technology today, the tourists, you know, the communication is a different world. It's a different world. At that time there was some sort of primitive society. You know, there was, uh, people that were very simple people were thinking they had. You had an excuse, they had the average person hardly knew how to write, how to read at ah, that time. And they were the intellectual people, the priest, the lawyer, the doctor or whatever. And there was a, you know, reverence and very respect for the simple people that when they were walking in the street and somebody, all those people, they were educated, whatever.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>They used to bend the, uh, nod the head, remove the hat and say good morning, good afternoon or whatever. That was the environment in which my parents grew up. And so that's why that respect there was really not.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>There was ambition, but they just had dreams. They knew that they couldn't accomplish anything because their life was so simple and they didn't have the means to improve their life. So what happened was that, um, they just live daily life. They have, um, big families and they were just, uh, complacency. People were happy and with the simple life, they just leave. And that, of course, after world war two, with the, uh, um, rebuilding and, uh, the Marshall plan and all that, everything changed. Everything changed. And like I say, the technology, the communication and the tourists, uh, everything brought new life to those places.

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> Speaker C>Okay, what. Tell us about your book. You also wrote a book about your stories. So tell us where we can get it and what listeners can expect when they read it.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Yes, the book is called the american doctor. Uh, the reason, like I said before, uh, the american doctor came about because first of all, what happened was when, after I finished my training with my wife, we were young and we were going to different people houses or party or whatever, and I met different people there. And people mostly one person was inquired about me because, you know, uh, a, uh, foreign doctor, uh, speak of an accent. Uh, and they were integrated for what I was telling them, my life, how I started with nothing. As a matter of fact, my parents could even buy the books for me. I had to borrow a book for friends, you know. So what happened was that they.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And so on more than one occasion, there were more than one person that said that for China, you know, uh, this story is very interesting. Your life, whatever, you should write down that, because for the posterity and this and that. And of course, you know, I was busy, uh, practicing and working hard, uh, night and day.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>So I never pay attention to that until I live in the villages here in Florida. Now I'm retired, like I said, I'm just turning 83.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And, uh, while I was here, I have more time and my life is more relaxed. I don't have the stress or the practice. And, uh, more than one occasion, start to think about your early days. How was your life? What the up and down.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And so what happened was that in more than one occasion, start to remember those days and remember my parents when I was young. And so what happened was that I started to write down a few things and I sent that to my daughter. My daughter Vanessa, she's a lawyer and she live in New Jersey. And so she said, daddy, that's beautiful. And she encouraged me. And so he suggested, daddy, you have to write all this memoir for I have a granddaughter, Leno. She is going to be nine years old. And so, and I can say I'm not going to be here for the rest of my life, but I want perhaps this book that explain my humble beginning and maybe can be of some help for her or other people.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>It can be a motivoi, a motivation to work hard. And, uh, we all have a bad moment in life. Perhaps maybe one day when somebody's down or whatever, pick up this book and read one chapter and say, wow, look at this. If he did it, I can do that too. You know, maybe, perhaps. I wish that would be the case. So anyhow, so I wrote this book. It took several years. No, I was not writing constantly, but, you know, and, uh, and, uh, I venture when I finished this book, there was accepted the book. It can be purchased in Amazon or in bars and noble and talk, um, about my life, my career, my family. Also, people can inquire about an Instagram that the Salvatore for China Md. There are pictures of my family. Scour Argentina, United States, whatever.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And I would like to hear from people. I would like to hear from people when they read this book, to hear their comments.

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> Speaker C>Okay. You just gave out your contact information, so tell us about any upcoming projects that you're working on that people need to know about.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Well, you know what happened. Uh, my daughter wanted me to write whatever, but I'm not writing right now. I'm just a dreamer.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>A dreamer. I want, you know, uh, I just want for the world to be a better place at my age, you know, uh, I want for one piece in the world. That's my dream. I want everybody to be happy, everybody to be successful, to respect each other.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Of course it's a dream, but, uh, it would be nice, will be nice.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And so I start to write a few things, but, you know, it just is not the same. Like the book that just.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>I gave everything to this book.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And so you had to realize that going back to. I remember when I was, uh, I studied in University of la Plata, close to Buenos Aires, in Argentina.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>And I remember I was sharing, when I was in university, I was sharing the room.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Uh, we rented an old house where there are different rooms. And I was sharing the house with maybe 1012 other students. And I was the son of the immigrant, like I said before, my friends, God bless them, they were the son of the lawyer. The stanchion people have a lot of land, a lot of cows and doctors, uh, you name it. So what happened was that they, and they have money. So what happened, La Plata is a big center. Maybe 700,000 people has. And then in Friday afternoon, they used to leave and they used to go to Buenos Aires and have a good time until, uh, Monday, early in the morning. Okay. They had the money, they could enjoy life. I couldn't do that. So, thank God, I couldn't do that because I became somebody.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Because maybe if I have the money, maybe I will not have to have the willpower to sell. Maybe I don't know. You never know.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>So anyhow, that was the time when I used to lock myself in, borrow their books and study with their book, make notes, notes and this and that.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>So, you know, I start for nothing. I start for nothing. But there was all the time I thank my father that he gave me all the time. A little activate a little flame inside me to keep going. To, to keep going.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>There was no flame there. The fireplace didn't have a flame. There was maybe a charcoal there with a cover with ashes. It need to be blow the ash. It had to be blown and maybe blow some oxygen there to activate the flame. And that was I have and I thank that to my parents.

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> Speaker C>All right, ladies and gentlemen, and you have it, Doctor Fasina. Be sure to check him out on social media.

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> Speaker C>Go pick up his book follow rate review share this episode to as many people as possible. If you have any guests or suggestion topics, see Jackson 102. NeT is the place to send them. Thank you for listening and supporting the show. Jump in your favorite podcast app and hit follow and labor review. As always, thank you for listening and Doctor Fatina, thank you so much for joining us and sharing your story.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Thank you for having me. Thank you very much. Have a good day.

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> Dr. Salvador Ficina>Thank you.

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> Speaker A>For more information on the living the Dream podcast, visit www.djcurveball.com.

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> Speaker A>Until next time, stay focused on living the dream.