Wilderness Medicine Fellows

Benjamin Kitt, DO

Year of Completion: 2019
Medical School: Arizona College of Osteo Med of Midwestern Univ
Residency: Baystate Medical Center - Emergency Medicine

Ben grew up in a small Minnesota rural community. His parents had a love for the outdoors and handed down that passion to Ben. Most of his vacations growing up were spent camping, skiing, fishing or hunting. In college, he ran track and field where he was an all-conference sprinter and captain of the sprint team.

Ben ventured far from home and spent 5 years in Arizona completing medical school. While there he explored the southwest desert hiking and camping in the Grand Canyon, Havasupi falls, Flagstaff, Sedona and Antelope canyon. Ben continues to be an avid outdoorsman. He has skied extensively on both the east and west coast. In the fall he can be found with his dogs out in the field hunting upland game. In the winter he can be found ice fishing and skiing. He also enjoys cold weather medicine, running, and hockey.

Samir Patel, MD

Year of Completion: 2019
Medical School: Tufts University School of Medicine
Residency: Baystate Medical Center - Emergency Medicine

With a background growing up in Northern California camping throughout Sequoia, Redwood, Yosemite National parks, Samir developed a true passion for hiking and mountaineering, especially during his time in New Zealand. He is also an avid traveler with solo backpacking trips throughout central America, Oceanica, and East Asia including multi-day caving in Vietnam and summiting Mt. Toubkal in Morocco. Eventually he’ll hit South America and Antarctica to complete all 7/7 continents.

Samir became AWLS certified in 2017 while in Guatemala and will be completing his instructorship in the fall of 2018. He has a strong passion for teaching medicine and would love to further blur the lines between his career in the emergency room and the outdoors. Associated interests include high altitude medicine and physiology, climbing, kayaking, mounting biking (no-jumps), excessively elaborate meals on mountain tops, and whiskey to end the evening. Future plans include climbing Mt. Khuiten in Mongolia & working with the Himalayan Rescue Association in Spring of 2019 at the high altitude clinics serving the Mt. Everest region in Nepal.

PS: Sandals are all-terrain footwear for Dr. Patel.

Lauren Snyder, DO

Year of Completion: 2019
Medical School: Arizona College of Osteo Med of Midwestern Univ
Residency: Baystate Medical Center - Emergency Medicine

Hi there! I'm originally from Southern California where I grew up skateboarding, surfing and generally being at the beach. Family vacations involved many camping and hiking trips, and introduced me to some of my all-time favorite places like Yosemite, Lake Tahoe and Lake Shasta. When I moved to Arizona for medical school, I had to compensate for the lack of beach activities, and got into hiking and rock climbing in the desert terrain, and visited the Grand Canyon, Havasupai and Zion.

Residency brought me to the east coast, where I had fun exploring New England (and seasons!) with my black lab. Baystate is a wonderful place with lots of learning opportunities, but also has a friendly and collaborative culture, so I decided to stay for fellowship! Wilderness Medicine fellowship seemed like a natural choice, and I'm looking forward to the coming year where I'll be focusing my education and travel on tropical, surf and dive medicine. Cheers to new adventures- see you out there!