Shirlee Xie does not clearly remember every second of the fall that changed her life. 🏔️
On September 10, 2024, during the second day of a hiking trip through Switzerland with her husband, she fell about 91 meters on a mountain between Verbier and Cabane de Louvie. The multiple fractures in her spine left her paralyzed from the chest down.
Shirlee was a mother of two and had been practicing medicine for about 15 years at Hennepin Healthcare in Minnesota. The mountains were one of her great passions: this was already her fourth visit to Switzerland.
Nearly two years later, she returned to the place she had long feared she would never get back to: the hospital. Today she treats patients about one day a week while relearning how to practice medicine from a wheelchair.
“I feel like I recovered a part of myself that I had lost. I feel whole again”, she said after putting on her white coat once again. 💙