Pulling Back the Curtain
David Schenkein, MD
In this edition, David Schenkein, MD, walks us through the three stages
– and counting – of his career. Dr. Schenkein is a general partner at GV
(formerly Google Ventures), where he coleads the life science investment
team, and an adjunct attending physician in hematology at Tufts Medical
Center in Boston.
Dr. Schenkein biking in Miami (left) and on an
annual skiing trip to Utah with his daughter
(above).
Tell us about your childhood.
Where did you grow up?
I grew up in the Forest Hills neigh-
borhood of Queens, New York.
Ours was a pretty typical, middle-
class family. My father was a self-
made, self-employed businessman
and my mother was a homemaker.
My brother and I are first-generation
Americans; our parents came from
Europe and met in the U.S. in the
1950s. Neither of them had gone
to college. I was supposed to attend
Forest Hills High School, but I ap-
plied to attend one of New York’s
specialized high schools and ended
up getting into Stuyvesant High
School. So, every day, I took the
subway to Manhattan for school.
Going to Stuyvesant was an eye-
opening experience for me
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because it exposed me to some
absolutely amazing teachers and
helped me focus my energy into
the sciences. heading toward medicine. In col-
lege, I wasn’t a dedicated premed
student, but medical school was
on my radar.
Why did science appeal to
you?
Even before high school, science
“clicked” for me more than the
subjects in the humanities.
I was one of those rare kids
who loved going to the doctor,
and my pediatrician was one of
my early role models in science.
He was amazing, unbelievably
kind, and, as a kid, I thought what
he did was sort of magical. When
I was in high school and starting
to think about my future, I knew I
was heading toward science and I
was reasonably certain that I was When did your focus shift to
hematology and research?
After graduating as a chemistry
major from Wesleyan University in
Connecticut – where I learned that
I loved being in the lab – I earned
my MD from the State University
of New York Upstate Medical Uni-
versity. Next, I went to Boston to
do my internship and residency at
what was then called the Tufts New
England Medical Center.
I was convinced early in my
internship that I wanted to stay
in academic medicine, but, like
many interns, I wanted to do
something different every month.
One month, I wanted to be an
infectious disease specialist, and
the next month I thought about
specializing in renal medicine. I
cycled through all the different
subspecialties. The lightbulb went
off as a first-year resident when I
was on a hematology rotation. The
attending that month happened to
be Robert Schwartz, MD.
Working with Dr. Schwartz as a
resident, I watched him synthesize
a patient’s illness by taking the his-
tory, conducting exams, and exam-
ining blood under the microscope.
Pulling it all together, it became
clear to me how amazing hema-
tology was. I fell in love with that
whole approach and he became my
professional mentor.
I didn’t see any other sub-
specialties, at least in my myopic
view at the time, where you took
care of everything about that
patient. I am biased, but blood is
the center of the soul. I just loved
sitting at the microscope doing
hematology work. That rotation
with Dr. Schwartz cemented my
decision to apply for a fellowship
in hematology and oncology.
I stayed in Boston to do
a fellowship at Tufts because
I wanted to train with two
June 2019