The Year that Made Me: Dr Olivia Ong, 2008

Sunday Extra - Separate stories podcast · Mar 21, 2026 · 25m

Early in her medical career, Dr Olivia Ong decided that instead of becoming a neurosurgeon, she would go into rehabilitation medicine. Little could she know how important that field would be to her not just as a doctor, but also as a patient. Because one otherwise-ordinary work day, when a driver with dementia in the hospital parking lot accidentally hit the accelerator instead of the brake, Olivia was hit by a car and left with a serious spinal injury. She was told she would never again.