Profession: Physician/Entrepreneur
Birthplace: Fresno, California
Position: Physician/Owner, Cudaceus Productions
The hardest thing about writing about Michael Wool is figuring out what he is. He’s a licensed physician who develops products for the medical industry while producing films and publishing a website for the medical profession. And he’s certainly not afraid to take risks.
While an undergraduate, he actually marketed an empty wine bottle as a gag gift, labeled “Drought Le Drought.” That gag earned him a spot on the Tonight Show. His unpredictable streak continued even after he earned his M.D. from George Washington University and began solo practice in 1985 — he opened an ice cream parlor called Scoops.
Between 1985 and 1992 he also served on the reasearch and practice staffs of six different hospitals in California. He’s now an attending physician at Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles and a research physician for AIDS clinical research at UCLA medical center.
And that’s barely half of it.
In 1987 Wool started Digitcare, a company which designs and sells latex gloves to the medical industry to address the “need for a quality product that would address universal precautions and concerns in the face of the HIV epidemic.”
That same year Wool entered the UCLA School of Motion Picture and Television Screenwriting. At the prestigious Sundance Film workshop he studied under noted “script doctor” Robert Towne. He took this training and started two production companies — Caduceus and the Academy of Continuing Education Programs, dedicated respectively to medicine and media. Together with some partners, he has since formed Orbital Intermedia, an Internet provider of education and multimedia to the medical marketplace.
By combining his own active research with that of his companies, Wool has integrated education, business and media for the medical community while staying on the cutting edge of technology. At the same time, he remains an actively-practicing doctor.
“My free time is usually spent going off to the park or beach with a notepad to draw, paint or write,” says Wool.
“There is always an opportunity. Recognize the opportunity,” he advises. “Obtain the resources, and not necessarily financial, to act on the opportunity. Optimize the use of those resources and in an emergency, take your pulse first.”
Wool is married to Dr. Roberta Wong. The two met during a benefit beauty contest.
