Lizard Talk with Dr. Emily Scibetta

We welcomed the second speaker in our 2023-24 Lizard Talk series earlier this week: Dr. Emily Scibetta.

Emily is a Maternal Fetal Medicine Specialist at Ventura County Medical Center, where she cares for mothers with high-risk and medically complex pregnancies. She is also mom to Anna in Oak Grove’s 4th grade and Diego in Kindergarten at Monica Ros.

Born and raised in Virginia, Emily moved to California to join the UCLA women’s swim team. After college, she worked in Maternal Mortality and HIV in South Africa and Burma, before attending medical school at UCSF, where she also completed her residency in Obstetrics and Gynecology. Emily then returned to UCLA to undertake her fellowship training in Maternal Fetal Medicine, during which she focused her research on innovative prenatal care services to improve health outcomes for underserved patients in LA County.

During her Lizard Talk, Emily shared her professional journey in medicine with our high school students, discussed the various elements of her day-to-day role at Ventura County Medical Center, and spoke about the importance of Reproductive Justice in her work.

She shared that her job is largely divided into three categories: medical care, which includes ultrasound, surgery, labor and delivery; counseling patients around complex decision-making in pregnancy; and bearing witness to the personal experiences of her patients, which are often influenced by their socio-economic circumstances.

“Learning how she sacrifices so much to help others…that was really inspiring and admirable. ”
– Coco, 11th Grade

Our high school students were captivated by Emily’s deeply personal account of her work: how she initially struggled with her hands shaking while performing surgeries but overcame her nervousness through skill-building and repetition; how she practices sensitivity when it comes to delivering difficult news; how she processes loss of life; and how her interest in structural inequality ultimately inspired her to choose a path in reproductive health because she felt that this was where she could have the most impact.

We thank Emily for taking the time out of her busy schedule to share her experience with our high school students.

About Lizard Talks

The Oak Grove Lizard Talks comprise a series of TED Talk-inspired presentations for our high school students that take place throughout the school year. For each talk a guest speaker visits our campus and tells their story, with topics ranging from professional to deeply personal accounts on a variety of subjects.