PHYSICIAN Q&A
Arnel Balbuena, M.D.

Family medicine addresses the health of individuals and families across all ages, genders, diseases, and parts of the body. Arnel Balbuena, M.D., is certified by the American Board of Family Medicine and joined HMF in 2008.

You trained in OB/GYN, then switched to Family Medicine. Why?

OB/GYN is exciting. During my internship, I performed more than 300 deliveries, including Cesarean sections. However, an obstetrician-gynecologist is mostly concerned with one facet of a female patient’s life.

Family medicine lets me establish long-term relationships with patients and families. As a primary care physician, I can treat a wide variety of conditions and help my patients prevent problems.

Do you treat entire families?

I do treat some couples, and more and more patients are asking me to treat their children who are in high school or starting college. I accept patients as young as 15, which is younger than any of my colleagues at HMF’s 10 Congress office.

Now that you’ve been treating patients for more than a year, what have you learned that they didn’t teach you in medical school?

I feel my medical training was excellent preparation for seeing patients. What they don’t teach you is the business side of managing a practice. I’m learning more every day.

How did you decide on a college and a major?

I wanted a campus with a strong reputation for science and enough variety to allow me to study different subjects.  Occidental College was a good fit. As a smaller, liberal arts college, Oxy has a small student-teacher ratio so you don’t get lost in the crowd.

I earned my degree in biochemistry and took advantage of summer research opportunities to further my science education. I also took classes in music, art, Asian studies and Japanese. I played Division III tennis, something I couldn’t have done at a larger school.

Why biochemistry?

All the major science requirements were met under the biochemistry major, so that made the choice easy for me. I put my degree to work right away. I taught ninth grade science at Pasadena’s Polytechnic School for a year before medical school.

Where did you receive the balance of your education?

I earned my M.D. from Chicago Medical School, and then returned to Los Angeles for an internship at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and my residency at USC/California Hospital Medical Center. Like many doctors, I completed various locum tenens assignments in urgent care, occupational medicine, and geriatric outpatient clinics.

Do you still have time for sports and volunteer work?

My wife and I recently had our first child, so now everything revolves around our son. We’re now on a more predictable schedule, so I started running around the Rose Bowl and going to the gym with my wife. I still play piano but haven’t learned anything new in a while. My new hobby is photographing my son and showing the pictures to my patients on my iPhone.