Med school graduate lands rare residency in plastic surgery

Ying Ku, a member of the medical school’s Class of 2024, was inspired by her mother’s battle with breast cancer to focus on plastic surgery, a statistically rare path for a DO graduate

Ying Ku came to the United States after graduating from high school when she was 18. Her mother left for the U.S. two years earlier, but Ku remained in Taiwan — attending school, working and waiting for a green card — waiting for the day she could join her family in the sandhills of North Carolina. 

That’s how this story begins, anyway.

In the end, it’s a story of the power of restoration. Of transformation. Of achievement and realization.

The culmination of a long, sometimes painful journey.

The deep roots of an odyssey that led her to this moment — walking the stage on May 9 as a graduate of Campbell University’s Jerry M. Wallace School of Osteopathic Medicine — and eventually on to the prestigious Cleveland Clinic as a resident plastic surgeon, statistically one of the toughest disciplines to secure for graduates of osteopathic medical schools. 

When Ku got her green card, she joined her mother in North Carolina and enrolled at Fayetteville Technical Community College. 

“I didn’t know I wanted to go into medicine,” she says. “I was just kind of figuring out what I wanted to do for life.” 

She studied, and she worked. She worked a lot. As a server and hostess, dishwasher and manager, in multiple restaurants during the week and on weekends. She transferred to N.C. State and began studying animal science, taking the first steps, she thought, toward becoming a veterinarian. 

Then, during her senior year at N.C. State in 2018, Ku joined Dr. Joe Cacioppo and students from Campbell University on a mission trip to Jamaica. Cacioppo chairs the Department of Community and Global Health at Campbell’s medical school. Ku got to know him and the others well during the trip.

“Everybody seemed very nice, and they really had this ‘family feeling,’” she said. “I didn’t know much about medical school. I just remember how welcoming they were. And all the students … they just answered my questions, and then they were all very encouraging. And very supportive, too. I think one big thing they are very proud of, according to the students and the faculty, when I came here was how supportive (Campbell) is. 

“I decided this is a place for me.” 

Ku applied to Campbell’s School of Osteopathic Medicine largely because of the mission trips — she  served in the Dominican Republic during her first year of medical school — and was accepted. As it turned out, she had figured things out. 

Mostly. 

Ku has a passion for global health, as well as parallel initiatives toward that goal. She initially thought about emergency medicine, or primary care, a hallmark of the medical school. 

Sometime during her third year of med school, Ku found an interest in plastic surgery. She took a research gap year in the department of Plastic & Reconstructive Surgery at the Cleveland Clinic. She learned surgical techniques and published a relatively astonishing number of papers. Some of her responsibilities included setting up the operating room, preparing various solutions for the experiments and tracking samples and data collection. 

She made connections and attended national and regional meetings involving processes and procedures. 

“It just kind of confirmed my interest (in plastic surgery),” she says. 

But she had other reasons, bigger reasons, to enter the specialty. Heartbreaking yet — ultimately — inspiring. 

Ku’s mother died eight months after Ku moved to the U.S. Her stepfather died a year later.

Her mother, Ginny, died of breast cancer. She was only 58.

During her gap year, the plastic surgeon Ku shadowed regularly performed breast reconstruction surgery. Ku thought of her mother.

A lot.

“She didn’t have any breast reconstruction done … because of some health care barriers and language issues,” Ku says. “I would just remember how ashamed she was of her body … during her last few years of life.” 

Ku had given little thought to breast reconstruction before then. 

Plastic surgery, she says, changes lives. Across the globe. 

“A lot of plastic surgeons go abroad for cleft lips and palates. And then also some burn contractures, some hand surgery. I realized that I can incorporate that into my future practice — global health, humanitarian outreach,” Ku says. 

That power of restoration — to care, to comfort. To heal. 

“I just really liked the restorative power of plastic surgery. You can treat a person from head to toe, from young to old, there’s no limitation. The whole field is very innovative. And we can give patients back their confidence. And I just don’t think there’s any other field like this.” 

Rare for a DO 

Of the 150-plus graduates in this year’s med school class, two will begin their residencies in neurology, two in ophthalmology, two in otolaryngology — commonly called ear, nose and throat doctors — two in radiology and one each in dermatology and pathology.

And one in plastic surgery. 

“From 2020-23, an increasing proportion of osteopathic residents applied for the selected surgical subspecialties, increasing from 599 applicants in 2020 to 743 candidates in 2023,” according to the National Library for Medicine, part of the National Institutes of Health. Overall match rates for DOs remain significantly lower than MD match rates for each of these specialties as well as overall … with summative match rates of 52.89 percent for DOs compared to 73.61 percent for MDs in 2023 for the selected surgical subspecialties. 

For plastic surgery, in that time frame, match rates tilt even more dramatically — 4.17 percent for DOs, versus 68.84 percent for MDs.

“There were significantly lower rates for DO candidates compared to MD candidates matching into selected surgical subspecialties of neurosurgery, thoracic surgery, vascular surgery, ENT, plastic surgery, orthopedic surgery and general surgery,” the library said. 

A mission of Campbell’s medical school is training doctors to care for rural and underserved populations in North Carolina, the Southeastern United States and the nation. 

All 152 graduating Campbell med students this year were placed in a residency program, in 31 states and Washington, D.C., including 51 who will stay in North Carolina. Forty of the graduating students will specialize in family medicine and 33 in internal medicine. 

Worldwide, 50,413 applicants registered in the 2024 Main Residency Match, an all-time high and an increase of 2,257 or 4.7 percent over last year, according to the National Resident Matching Program. 

“The rise in applicants was driven largely by an increase of 1,986 non-U.S. citizen international medical graduates and 623 osteopathic seniors over last year. In the U.S., DO seniors achieved a 92.3 percent match rate, an all-time high and an increase of 0.7 percentage points over last year,” the NRMP writes. 

Since 2019, the DO senior match rate has increased 4.2 percentage points. 

Dr. Craig Fowler, professor and vice chair of surgery at Campbell, worked closely with Ku throughout her journey, and he has trained some 90 ophthalmology surgical residents and more than 20 corneal and refractive surgery fellows. Fowler served as a medical student adviser for the UNC School of Medicine and now Campbell. 

Plastic surgery, he says in echoing the numbers, is arguably the most difficult residency to land, on par with neurosurgery, urology, general surgery, ophthalmology and dermatology. 

Ku, said Fowler, is amazing. 

Remarkable. 

“I’m so proud of her,” Fowler says. “And, she maintained positivity throughout, and she has really worked.” 

Ku’s path to Cleveland was neither comfortable nor familiar. Often arduous and challenging. Often a struggle. Emotionally, mentally, spiritually. But that work ethic … 

Maxx Crosby is an edge rusher for the Las Vegas Raiders, and he’s one of the best in the NFL to do it. About 1,700 athletes play in the league. All of them are good, Crosby says on a social media post. Some are better. Others are great, the absolute best. 

Find out what it takes to rise to that level, Crosby says. Then do it. 

“That NFL story, she really embodies that,” Fowler says. “She earned it.” 

Ku bought a house in Cleveland for her upcoming residency. She’ll move there soon.