This edition of Salina Sees You, brought to you by Drs. Cooper & Banninger, LLC Family Vision Care (1000 E. Cloud) presents:
Dr. Marilee McBoyle-Wiesner, a Dickinson County trailblazing surgeon, who tells her story about defying the odds on becoming Kansas' first female board-certified general surgeon.
By: NICOLAS FIERRO
Salina Post
Dr. Marilee’s McBoyle-Wiesner’s fascinating journey started in 1959 when she underwent tonsillectomy surgery at age 7, performed by a woman, Dr. Ruth Montgomery-Short, which was uncommon at the time.
“She would tell me about three daughters she had at home and I was 7, but I remember thinking I have never known a lady like this, she takes tonsils out during the day and she goes to her daughters at home at night,” she said. “That made an impression on me.”
A couple years later, she read a book “Elizabeth Blackwell: The First Woman Doctor” which impressed her as well.
“I read that, and oh my the hardships she went through and the discrimination, I mean it was big league and I remember being so impressed by her on how she pressed on,” she said.
At the time, McBoyle-Wiesner then told her mother she wanted become a doctor.
Unconditional support
Born and raised on a farm 10 - 11 miles south of Abilene, Marilee commended and appreciated her parents for their unconditional love and support they expressed to her when she was pursuing her medical career.
“As I got older, I appreciated them in ways that I did not when I was younger,” she said.
Marilee is the oldest of 2 sisters, as her father raised cattle and her mother being an elementary school teacher. Both her parents were successful in their ways, as they graduated from the University of Kansas. Her father receiving a political science degree and her mother earning a business degree. However, they both decided to put aside their goals and decided to return back to rural Abilene to help save the McBoyle farm.
“I have greater appreciation for them on that, because I was able to fulfill my dream of becoming a doctor,” McBoyle-Wiesner said. “They never tried to push me in any direction, and the goal of going to medical school was mine. For whatever I was going to go into, it was very life affirming.”
She attended Kansas State Teachers college, now Emporia State Univeristy from 1970-1974.
Marilee started medical school in Kansas City, where she completed 1 1/2 years. She then transferred to Wichita in January 1976, for the last 1 1/2 years of her medical school journey.
After graduating in 1977, she attended a 5-year general surgery residency at St. Francis Hospital, which was under the University of Kansas School of Medicine-Wichita (KUSM-Wichita). This is where McBoyle-Wiesner, became the first woman accepted into the surgery residency.
After her 5 years there, she then went to the University of New Mexico (UNM) in Albuquerque, NM to do a 1-year fellowship in burn and trauma surgery.
Following her time there, McBoyle-Wiesner had the opportunity to return back to Wichita, which she did in the summer of 1983 and became part of the Wichita Surgical Group (now, Wichita Surgical Specialist).
Marilee was the first ever female to practice in the group.
Never being discouraged
Going back to her medical school days, McBoyle-Wiesner said she thought about going into family medicine.
“I though surgery was going to be the worst months of my life,” she said.
However, she did not let this discourage her as she became fascinated with patients coming in with a problem and surgeons having a thoughtful process of trying to diagnose the issue.
“It was a wonderful sequence of events and little by little, I could not believe that I was starting to have a change in heart from thinking this was going to be worst time in my life, to this is kind of fascinating,” McBoyle-Wiesner said.
McBoyle-Wiesner said word went around that there has never been a female surgical resident at St. Francis and “forbid that there would ever be one."
“That was just the consensus everywhere you went around the hospital,” she said. “I thought well I have a choice, I can take the hearsay from every other place in the hospital or I can go to the Chairman of the Department myself, and prepare to hear it directly from him.”
She then went to speak to the Chairman of the Department and told him how much she loved surgery. The Chair told her they would consider in having her apply to the school and she walked away feeling “euphoric.”
“What I would tell anybody, is just because the first interview goes well, don’t expect the same thing in the second,” she said.
At the time of the second interview, the Chair of Department gave her a series of questions that she was going against the odds.
“They were starting to pepper me with questions. Do you know there has never been anybody that has done this? Do you know how lonely it will be for you? Do you know how you will be looked upon? Do you know that patients won’t want to come to you because you are a female? I mean just one after the other,” she said. “So I sat there, listened and told them, I realize patients may not want to come to me and that is fine, that is their right, but for anybody that might want to come to me, I will give them the best care I know to give.”
When she officially started her residency, she did not expect the hospital to change how they operated. For example, Marilee said due to St. Francis never having a female resident, meant they did not have a women’s changing room and no call room for female resident surgeons.
“I did not make a big deal about some of those things, because I realize I needed all my energy to try to learn what I needed to learn and I could not go around always having a chip on my shoulder, that something maybe was not fair for me,” she said.
Throughout her perseverance, McBoyle-Wiesner said she started to see a change around St. Francis. Overtime, she started seeing the hospital implement a call room for women and a women’s changing room. She added, that now when she goes back to St. Francis, she “smiles inwardly.”
“I just smile inwardly, because it was progress that was made,” she said. "I think it served me well to realize, this was new for the hospital, but to not expect them to send out an alert that we have to make big changes because Marilee has arrived. No, I arrived, just adapted and little by little I think they saw things that could be better.”
Marilee added that she was treated well throughout her residency years. Toward the end of her residency, the Chairman of the Department admired her work. The Chairman asked if she would work for the hospital, but advised she should go away for a year, so she can get the proper training she needs before she returned.
This is where she did her 1-year fellowship at UNM and later became Kansas' first female board-certified general surgeon.
She married her husband, Tim Wiesner in 1988 and had three sons Tim Jr., Tom and Thaddeus from 1990-1994.
McBoyle-Wiesner retired from her surgical practice in 2000 with the Wichita Surgical Group, and started teaching medical students.
In October 2023, she was inducted as a full member of the American College of Surgeons’ Academy of Master Surgeon Educators®.
She retired from teaching at KUSM-Wichita last year in December. The skills lab at KUSM-Wichita officially named their surgical skills lab in her honor.
Now retired in Wichita, she still supports future physicians through the Marilee McBoyle Pre-Medical Scholarship and has served on the Emporia State University Alumni Association Board of Directors.
"I am indebted to the Lord and to so many that have contributed along the way," McBoyle-Wiesner said. "My heart is overflowing with gratitude and for so many that have played a role in my life."
Salina sees you, Marilee-McBoyle Wiesner.
If you would like to share your personal story or know anyone who may have a story that will inspire each reader, please email Salina Post News Director, Nicolas Fierro: [email protected] or [email protected] (during regular business hours).
You can also contact: (785) 656-9856 (during regular business hours).