McGovern, the Next Generation: David Lopez
The first words were simple: add, subtract.
For David Lopez, saying them aloud during math class meant more than answering a question correctly. They were among the first English words he felt confident using at school.
“I felt seen for the first time,” Lopez said. “You’re connecting with an environment that you never used to connect to before.”
Spanish was the primary language he used in his home. When his parents immigrated to the United States, they knew little English, so the family continued speaking Spanish together. Home felt safe and familiar. School did not.
Lopez remembers the days of returning returning home and telling his mother that no one understood him and that he could not understand anyone else. She reassured him that things would eventually be okay.
They worked on their English together. The progress came gradually, one word at a time. Math helped because the language was simple, and the ideas already made sense to him.
“I actually began to speak a little bit of English,” Lopez said. “Even if it was just simple, like, ‘you add,’ or ‘you subtract.’”
Learning how to communicate gave him more than a new language. It taught him how isolating it can feel when people cannot express what they need or understand what is happening around them.
Years later, Lopez saw members of his family encounter a similar feeling in the healthcare system.
Relatives living in Chicago told him that seeking care could feel intimidating. Access was difficult. When they did see a physician, they did not always feel a personal or cultural connection.
Lopez understood why that mattered.
He remembered his own first visit with a primary care physician who shared his cultural background. The familiarity helped him take the encounter more seriously, and his mother responded similarly.
“The doctor seemed like she resonated with me,” Lopez said. “She was very reasonable and understood where I was coming from.”
Afterward he called his relatives and shared what he had learned during the appointment. Their response stayed with him.
“I wish I had this experience,” they told him.
Lopez began to think about the number of patients looking for physicians who understand not only their symptoms, but also the culture, language, and experiences shaping how they approach care.
“If you don’t resonate with a physician, sometimes that could be the barrier to getting that healthcare,” he said.
Now a first-year student at McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston, Lopez wants to help remove some of those barriers. He grew up in an underserved community and hopes to eventually provide care in places where access remains limited.
To Lopez, that work begins with making people feel comfortable enough to ask questions and participate in their own care. A physician may understand the medicine, but patients also need to believe that the person across form them understands where they are coming from.
That is one reason family medicine currently appeals to him. He likes the opportunity to speak directly with patients, build relationships, and focus on preventive care before a health problem requires hospitalization.
The path to medical school has also carried a particularly special meaning for his family. Lopez is the first person in his family to attend any graduate program. When he told his parents he had been accepted, he said they were “over the moon.”
His parents had come to the United States hoping to create a better future for their children. Medical school was exciting, but it was also unfamiliar. His parents worried about the cost, his safety, and what it would mean for him to leave home for the first time.
Even still, Lopez could see how proud they were.
“That’s one of my biggest motivators,” he said.
During moments of doubt, he thinks about them and the reasons they made their own difficult move years earlier.
“I’m here for a reason,” Lopez said. “This is for me. I’ve got to make my family proud, but I also want to make myself proud.”
Medical school is a journey he chose, and one he believes he was called to follow. He hopes that by completing it, he can make the healthcare system feel less intimidating for families like his own.
The child who once came home upset because no one understood him now wants to become the person patients know will listen.