I build medical devices, study medicine, and cook tasty foods.
Neil Koby Reid grew up in Lakewood, CA, before receiving his bachelor’s degree in biophysics and master’s in biomedical engineering from the University of Southern California. While at USC, he worked in the Brain-Body Dynamics Lab on tendon-driven robots and neuromuscular motor control in athletes. Later, Koby discovered an interest in operations improvement and worked with Los Angeles County Hospital to develop a quality management tool to track surgical site infections. Most recently, he has been developing a low-resource surgical kit that was presented at NASA’s Human Research Program’s annual meeting and is exploring its applications in disaster relief, military medicine, and global surgery.
He is pursuing a career in general surgery with a focus on distributing healthcare to people in remote locations. Traveling to the regional medical center for complex treatment is the current trend, but with clever solutions, we can treat many problems locally. Throughout his career, Koby plans to leverage his engineering background to develop logistical and technological solutions for delivering medical care in austere environments. Most importantly, Koby values a community-rooted physician that delivers quality care, close to home.
Koby enjoys backpacking, car camping, and saltwater fishing when he’s not busy with school and appropriately holds an officer position in Texas A&M’s Wilderness Medicine Interest Group. You’ll often find him driving across the country on his breaks from school to check off all the national parks from his list. When sticking around Houston, he enjoys grilling over open fires in his backyard and playing frisbee golf at his favorite local courses.