After twists and turns, doctor finds her calling
Almost every critical moment in Dr. Marcia Krebs’ life over the past several decades has an interesting anecdote.
It started when she was 11. As a little girl growing up in Oswego, her dream was to pursue medicine. But then she had to endure hospital visits, watching doctors take care of her mother, who was battling cancer. After her mother passed away, she shied away from that dream.
But the itch didn’t completely go away, and she started college as a pre-medicine major. After taking several classes, though, she wasn’t interested enough and chose another profession.
“I thought I was going to save the world and be a social worker,” says Krebs, who now works at Pluta Cancer Center, 125 Red Creek Drive.
After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in sociology, she couldn’t find a job and worked as a Pizza Hut waitress while she pursued her master’s degree. She had worked her way to manager when another moment changed her life.
One day, a customer yelled at her because the mushrooms in a half-mushroom/half-pepperoni pizza crossed slightly over to the other side.
“As he was yelling at me, I couldn’t stop thinking that there had to be something more important in life than getting screamed at over a pizza. That day I decided that I had to do something different in my life,” says Krebs, of Pittsford.
She went to medical school. While in school she faced another decision: what her specialty was going to be. Every medical rotation she was placed on was oncology, whether it was pediatrics, gynecology or surgery.
As a medical student, she was working in a bone marrow transport when she met a patient, Sister Mary Theresa, who was suffering a relapse of leukemia and was in for chemotherapy at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis.
Krebs says her patient looked into her eyes and told her that she was going to be an oncologist because “you have a special way with people.”
“It’s almost like the plan was laid out for me before I started,” said Krebs, who decided to honor the dying nun’s wish.
The last story revolves around Krebs coming back to upstate New York, where she has relatives, after working four years at the Shore Cancer Center in Virginia. She received a postcard from a headhunter about the Pluta Cancer Center in Henrietta, similar to postcards she received on a weekly basis that she usually threw away.
This time, though, her husband took the postcard and googled the center and found out it was in the Rochester area.
“It’s like some things in life are meant to be,” said Krebs, who interviewed and received the job this year.
People often ask her how she can be in such a demoralizing field, where she sometimes sees patients battling terminal disease. She said people still think cancer is the No. 1 cause of death, when it’s actually heart disease.
“It’s not always depressing,” said Krebs. “We do have our joys and cures as well as some sadness. Helping people battle through one of the hardest moments of their lives and through their illness is very rewarding. People in Rochester are lucky because there are several cancer centers around. When I worked in Virginia, we were the only one within 90 miles.”
Cari Rosario-Mathieu, a Pluta Cancer Center nurse, said she sees why patients feel at ease with Krebs.
She describes the physician as patient and straightforward but with a kind demeanor.
“The first time you meet an oncologist and get diagnosed with cancer, it causes nerves and anxiety,” said Rosario-Mathieu, of Brighton. “Dr. Krebs gives them a calming sense that makes them feel a lot better about their situation. They feel like there is a plan in place and that the doctor and them are going to work together.”
