Drs. Daniel and Benjamin Musher exemplify two generations of excellence at Baylor
Excellence often spans generations at Baylor College of Medicine, as exemplified by Daniel Musher, M.D., Distinguished Service Professor of Medicine and professor of Molecular Virology and Microbiology, and his son Benjamin Musher, M.D. ’00, the Barry Stephen Smith Memorial Endowed Professor, professor of Hematology and Oncology in the Department of Medicine and medical director of Medical Oncology for the Dan L Duncan Comprehensive Cancer Center. This father and son share many things—a reverence for weekly family meals on the Sabbath, an affinity for playing in string quartets and a deep commitment to practicing medicine and advancing discovery at Baylor. Across distinct careers, both have helped patients while conducting groundbreaking research and building deeply rewarding professional lives through their enduring connection to Baylor.
Dr. Daniel Musher’s Baylor journey began more than five decades ago, when he was recruited to work at the Veterans Affairs Hospital in Houston, one of Baylor’s earliest affiliates (later renamed the Michael E. DeBakey VA Medical Center), where he excelled in patient care, teaching and research, becoming the renowned infectious disease specialist he is today. His personal philosophy plays a critical role in his success.
“You must see the patient as a human being first, and only then, as if the patient has an interesting scientific problem,” he said. “That is the stimulus for research. If doctors would look upon every patient in those ways, they would always find their work rewarding and fulfilling.”
For Dr. Ben Musher, those years when his father was at the VA represent early, lasting memories of accompanying his father and two sisters to the laboratory on Sunday mornings. They would watch his experiments, assist with simple tasks and absorb the atmosphere of scientific discovery. These Sunday mornings sparked an early appreciation for medicine and research.
Today, Dr. Ben Musher has forged his own path in oncology, specializing in gastrointestinal and pancreatic cancers, and he has made his father’s human-centered approach his own.
If earning his medical degree from Baylor gave him a deep understanding of the responsibility and accountability of being a physician, it was during his residency at the University of Washington School of Medicine, when he interacted with cancer patients, that he realized he wanted to pursue oncology. This viewpoint was confirmed during his oncology fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania.
Unlike many specialties, oncology allowed him to form long-term relationships with patients, during which he could guide them through treatment while also still contributing to the field’s rapidly evolving scientific advances. His approach comes back to his concept of what a physician’s purpose is—to help people and advance science, and to do that with careful, daily work that builds over time and will not be accomplished overnight.
In that sense, Dr. Benjamin Musher’s career is both entirely his own and a continuation of something larger, a thread running from those Sunday mornings at the VA with his father through every patient he has sat with since.
When asked what means the most to him as a father, Dr. Daniel Musher said: “Karol and I are blessed with three of the most wonderful children ever. What can I say?”
For a man who has spent his profession finding the right words—for patients, for trainees, for research proposals—sometimes the best answer is the simplest one.
