Dr. David Oelberg, is the chief pulmonologist at Danbury Hospital.
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Dr. David Oelberg, the chief pulmonologist at Danbury Hospital, paces himself by placing his finish lines months and miles away.
Oelberg was born in Montreal, Canada. “I speak French but it”™s not my first language,” said Oelberg.
Oelberg attended McGill University in Montreal.
“I was interested in mechanical engineering out of high school,” said Oelberg. “Though by the end of college, I got interested in medicine. I did my residency at one of the McGill University hospitals.”
Oelberg began jogging at the age of 20.
“In Canada high school sports was a whole different thing,” said Oelberg. “There”™s hockey of course and I played hockey, but no baseball or football team.”
During his residency Oelberg also became involved in track cycling and velodrome cycling. He was able to utilize the velodrome built for the Montreal 1976 Olympics. His racing career then exited the track in favor of road racing and criteria racing, done around city blocks.
“I wasn”™t a terribly competitive cyclist,” said Oelberg. “In running, I did always seem to be fairly fast and able to run for long periods, but it was always just a kind of stay-in-shape thing.”
Oelberg and his wife Liana Fraenkel are both physicians. “We met in first year med school and got married in third year med school,” said Oelberg. “We moved to Boston in 1994.”
A trend for physicians coming out of McGill was to go to the U.S. to get specialty training at a big university hospital there and then bring that back to McGill, which was the couple”™s original plan.
Oelberg did his fellowship in pulmonary and critical care at Massachusetts General Hospital at Harvard University.
“We ended up branching off at that point with our specialties,” said Oelberg. “She”™s in rheumotology and I went into pulmonary critical care.”
While in Boston Oelberg began to use his biking hobby as transportation.
“I commuted 365 days a year,” said Oelberg. “I”™d go along the Charles; it was about 8 to 10 miles each way.”
After spending four years in Boston, Oelberg made the decision to go into practice while his wife stayed in research.
“The plan had been to go back to Quebec at that point, though some of the people who had mentored us were leaving Quebec and the referendum which ended up being the 51-to-49 vote by Quebecers to decide to not proceed with sovereignty,” said Oelberg. “Given that kind of unstable political environment we decided to stay within the U.S.”
Oelberg found a job at Danbury Hospital and his wife landed a research position at Yale.
When Oelberg came to Danbury, he ditched the bike “and got out of shape for about a year or two. My 40th birthday was coming up, and guess it was a little bit of a midlife thing. I had always thought about running a marathon. I said I”™d just train and do it.”
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Oelberg began training in fall 2002 and ran the Vermont Marathon in spring 2003.
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“What I”™ve learned after is that training for 6 months to run a marathon is probably not enough,” said Oelberg. “At that point I was just hoping to hit 3:30. I ended up being 3:39 and being really wiped at the end of that, but the moment I crossed the finish line I thought: I”™ll do it next time.”
Oelberg said he was amazed at how the body finds the strength at mile 26 after feeling like it will never make it at mile 19 or 20.
“Having a marathon six months or a year ahead of you was a way to push my training and to continue with it,” said Oelberg. “Since the first marathon, over the last seven years, it”™s been rare that I”™ll miss a day or two of running.”
Oelberg typically runs at 5 a.m., when necessary with a headlamp. His wife has also begun to run with him.
“I”™ve run into three bears, always deer, foxes and all the other stuff,” said Oelberg, who has run the Mystic, New Jersey, Boston, and Chicago marathons. A 26.2-mile jaunt in Philadelphia is on the race docket this year.
Oelberg said that at Danbury Hospital, among the staff, there is a subculture of runners.
“It”™s been a great thing for our office,” said Oelberg. “We”™re seven full-time pulmonologists and of the seven five are regular runners. It”™s had a positive impact as to how we function as a group. It brings everyone to the same level when you”™re in a pair of shorts and a singlet outside and you”™re huffing and puffing.
“Even if there”™s no talking you learn things about people when they”™re running, you see all kinds of dynamics. I love running with people but I also love running alone. It gives you time to put things in order and digest things that are going on in your live. I view it as productive time and it”™s had an incredibly positive influence on my life.”
In 2008 Oelberg became chief of the pulmonologist section at Danbury Hospital. He and his wife live in Newtown with their two boys.
