Inspired by the doctor who saved his finger, a Kelseyville baseball standout is heading to medical school

Almost 10 years ago a rural doctor repaired Kelseyville High grad’s Noah Lyndall’s shattered hand. Today, Lyndall is on his way to becoming same kind of doctor. |

Noah Lyndall’s path to medical school has not been a straight line.

There have been twists and detours, struggles and successes.

But last week, there was Lyndall, 26, getting his white coat in a ceremony at UC Davis Medical School, marking the start of his yearslong med school journey and making official what everyone around Lyndall has known for years: He’s going to be a doctor.

The road to Saturday’s ceremony began almost a decade ago when the multisport athlete from Kelseyville emerged from the bottom of a football scrum with his right index finger broken in 13 places.

The first doctor who looked at his shattered hand thought he could fix it but told a young Lyndall that his baseball and football playing days were over. A second doctor concurred.

“They said I wouldn’t be able to play sports, write correctly, I wouldn’t be able to follow my sports dreams,” Lyndall said. “I wasn’t OK with that and neither were my parents.”

Someone pointed the family to Dr. William Bowen of Willits.

By Lyndall’s recollection, the family went to Bowen’s office at 8:30 one night and he was in surgery the following morning.

“He completely fixed my finger,” he said. “He basically built a metal finger and fused it with bones that were healthy. It’s fully functioning, full feeling, full rotation.”

While he eventually stopped playing football, the successful surgery allowed Lyndall to keep playing baseball. And that was good, because he had legit talent.

But there was more to Bowen’s surgical magic than just a sports recovery story. When he fixed that hand, he ignited a dream.

“He saved my life at that time, saved my whole future, saved my dreams,” Lyndall said. “He got me interested in being a doctor.”

Today Lyndall wants to follow Bowen’s footsteps into orthopedics. And, like Bowen, he wants to practice in a small, rural community where services are often sparse.

To that end, Lyndall was one of 139 students inducted into the University of California at Davis School of Medicine on a recent Saturday. Each was issued their white coat, symbolizing the start of their medical studies.

And further still, Lyndall was accepted into the Rural PRIME program, which trains medical students for careers in underserved, rural communities — much like his hometown of Kelseyville.

“I see myself practicing in a rural area,” he said. “I want to serve populations that don’t have a lot of help, that need more physicians, and places where you can’t have surgery because a doctor isn’t on that day.”

Lyndall’s road to UC Davis wasn’t straight, but looking back, it seems to have set him up with a fair dose of experience and insight into his future field.

Let’s start with college.

After graduating from Kelseyville High School in 2016 as The Press Democrat’s Redwood Empire Small-School Baseball Player of the Year, he was set to attend Cal State East Bay on a baseball scholarship. That fell through when the coaching staff was let go, leaving Lyndall to scramble for a new deal.

He found one at Sonoma State University.

“In two days they came to watch me play, and they offered me (a spot),” he said. “Everything happens for a reason. I am a true believer in that.”

But there was a wrinkle. SSU doesn’t have a premed program. So Lyndall had to create his own.

He double-majored in biology and kinesiology. He did research into what each medical school wanted in its applicants, all the while juggling his commitment to Seawolves baseball.

“I was kind of my own counselor,” he said.

At SSU, Lyndall did what he has done seemingly his whole life: He built relationships, cultivated mentors and sought support.

This time, he linked up with Professor Steven Farmer who earned his Ph.D. in organic chemistry at UC Davis.

It was Farmer who helped Lyndall take the right classes to set him up to eventually apply to a variety of medical schools, each of which, according to Lyndall, asks for a different lineup of completed coursework.

“He encouraged me the whole time,” Lyndall said. “I’m beyond grateful.”

Meantime, Lyndall had an abbreviated baseball career at SSU. He redshirted one year and saw two more seasons lost to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Lyndall figures he could have tried to stretch out his eligibility, but he was playing the long game. He knew he wanted to go to medical school, so he put his focus there, not maxing out on baseball.

That’s not to say it was easy. In fact, he called it “heartbreaking.”

So Lyndall redirected. He doubled down. He graduated from SSU with a double major in 2021. He got his EMT certification and immediately joined the Lake County Fire Protection District.

And as he built up his hours of experience — he was getting trained as a firefighter and staffing an ambulance answering emergency calls in his home county — Lyndall was also studying for the medical school admission test.

He studied for a year, only to post a disappointing score. So he doubled down again.

He took another year to study and continued working at Lake County Fire.

And, as he has at every step of the way, he sought out mentors and counsel in his quest.

He leaned on lead firefighter and paramedic Jon Sarris, who he called a “huge influence.”

And when he’d bring patients into the emergency room at Adventist Clear Lake, he quizzed Dr. Linnea Lantz, assistant medical director of the emergency department: How did she handle such and such case? What should he do if he sees this in a patient? How is that case we brought in last week doing?

“He’s very intelligent,” Lantz said. “He’s very motivated … to learn and understand.”

But he’s also got something nearly unteachable: Empathy.

“When we are interacting with patients, it’s often the worst day of their life or the most terrifying,” she said. “He knows and has a tremendous drive to understand not only the medicine, but the human perspective behind it. Being able to provide comfort and reassurance to patients and their family is a really important skill, just about as important as the medicine because that is the part that the patient really understands and sees.”

Lantz said it’s Lyndall’s compassion, and his understanding of small towns and rural places, that sets him apart.

“He’s an empathetic person who brings a lot of light and warmth to people around him,” she said. “On top of that he has a drive for learning and understanding the science. All those things come together to make a really great physician.”

“I’m looking forward to seeing what he can do,” she said.

After his second go at the medical school entrance exam, Lyndall’s results gave him options. But Davis was his dream. Plus, they have the rural pathway that he’s now on.

So when he got in, the decision was already made.

“UC Davis has always been kind of my dream school,” he said. “For me, it was another level. It was my biggest goal.”

Growing up, it was UC Davis that took all of Lake County’s toughest cases, Lyndall said.

For Bowen, the rural doctor who almost 10 years ago put Lyndall’s crushed finger back together and set a dream in motion, it’s rewarding to see a medical student show a commitment to working in underserved communities.

The two stay in touch. Of course Lyndall has tapped Bowen for advice, for counsel and for direction.

But to Bowen’s mind, Lyndall, despite being a lifelong athlete, is a guy who doesn’t need much coaching. He’s got it all.

“His motivation is to help others and he’s committed to being in a rural community,” he said. “He’s going to make a great doctor.”

You can reach Staff Columnist Kerry Benefield at 707-526-8671 or kerry.benefield@pressdemocrat.com. On Instagram @kerry.benefield.