Breaking glass ceilings through orthopedic healing

Rachel Kroeger

Staff

October 6, 2025

GREEN BAY – Abbey DeBruin, the newest addition to Orthopedic & Sports Medicine Specialists’ (OSMS) Green Bay clinic, is making history as the medical provider’s first female orthopedic surgeon.

Additionally, according to OSMS leadership, DeBruin is currently the only sports medicine-fellowship-trained orthopedic surgeon in Northeast Wisconsin.

A native to the region, DeBruin said her passion for orthopedics was sparked by her own experience receiving care following a sport-related injury as a teenager.

“I went to high school at Kaukauna High School, and I unfortunately had an ACL tear playing basketball,” she said. “That was my first introduction to orthopedic surgery.”

As she began to explore the possibility of entering the orthopedic profession, DeBruin said Kaukauna High School offered her the chance to shadow different healthcare workers.

“They actually had a medical mentoring class where you were able to explore some different fields in medicine and shadow different people – ranging from nurses to physician assistants, physical therapists and surgeons as well,” she said. “So, that was my first time seeing behind the curtain in the field.”

A passion for orthopedics

Enjoying the idea of a career in health care, where she could dedicate herself to helping “other people in her day-to-day work,” DeBruin said she pursued her interest in orthopedics – first by attending Northern Michigan University for her undergraduate education.

“I studied biology and had some really great mentors there,” she said. “Then [I attended] medical school at the University of Wisconsin, and my residency was there as well. The last stop in my training was at the University of Virginia, where I did a sports medicine fellowship.”

Athletics being “a huge part of people’s identities,” DeBruin said, means treating sport-related injuries “can be really challenging at times.”

“I’ve liked a lot of different parts of orthopedic surgery, but [athletics] has always been a kind of a focus, or an area where I feel like I really have something to contribute – some extra empathy to bring in to help athletes through that whole process,” she said.

Drawing on her own experience as an injured athlete, DeBruin said, inspired her to pursue orthopedics as her medical specialty.

“Especially with some of the injuries we help take care of that can require a pretty lengthy recovery, I think it’s nice having that perspective – having been through that and then being able to get through that recovery and play basketball in college,” she said. “[I] share that experience with my patients so they see there are a lot of good things ahead of them once they recover.”

As a Northeast Wisconsin native, DeBruin said she’s grateful to have been able to make a return home and treat her neighbors through her employment with OSMS.

“That’s kind of the whole reason I’m doing this,” she said. “You can’t beat home and where your family is, and being able to be a part of that community and hopefully give back to some athletes in the area is what it’s all about.”

Though a sports medicine-fellowship-trained orthopedic surgeon, DeBruin said she works with patients across the board – regardless of how they were injured.

“I enjoy taking care of people of all ages,” she said. “I see people who are high school or college athletes, and then I also see people who are maybe in their 50s, 60s, 70s, and they’re active with pickleball or [even] not active. But I’m kind of a knee and shoulder specialist, so there are definitely knee and shoulder issues that range all the way up to arthritis.”

DeBruin said in her opinion, orthopedics is “the most exciting and best field of medicine.”

“If you have a patient with a fracture or broken bone, and you do the surgery to line it back up and fix it, that [offers] very immediate, tangible results, where you go from somebody who is completely incapacitated to somebody who is at least on their way to getting better,” she said. “So, I think we have a really cool niche in medicine where we get to do that more so than a lot of other fields, and I really enjoy that.”

With the range of injuries she and her peers at OSMS see, DeBruin said a range of treatment options is also required – with less than 30% of OSMS patients requiring surgery.

“We specialize in bones and joints, so we see everything in the musculoskeletal system here,” she said, “but there are plenty of conditions that maybe with physical therapy, sometimes an injection – other things short of surgery – that patients might be able to take advantage of.”

Prioritizing patients above all

DeBruin said the OSMS team has been “so welcoming” to her – adding that they “are definitely willing to mentor” her in her new position.

“At our location, we have around 12 orthopedic surgeons – but we have more in our other locations,” she said. “To be able to have this collaborative environment with them and lots of support from them as well, as I’m getting started, has been awesome.”

DeBruin said OSMS is also a healthcare provider she’s proud to work for – as it’s a physician-owned organization.

“What led me specifically to OSMS was the doctor-owned focus,” she said. “We get to really use our knowledge and our expertise to guide what the decisions are that the business is making based on what’s going to be the best for our patients as opposed to [directives] coming from admin who maybe doesn’t have the same background. It really gives me every opportunity to do the right thing and help take the very best care of my patients.”

Coming back to her roots not only as OSMS’ first female orthopedic surgeon, but the only current Northeast Wisconsin sport medicine-fellowship-trained surgeon in her field, DeBruin said, hasn’t brought on the fanfare one might expect.

“To be honest, right now, it kind of feels like I am any other person who’s starting a new job,” she said. “OSMS definitely chose me for this job because of the expertise and training I’m bringing, and not necessarily anything to do with gender.”

During her training, DeBruin said she was fortunate to have been surrounded with “many other women surgeons” who have served as mentors and are now friends – making her experience as OSMS’ first female surgeon feel normal as opposed to unconventional.

“It doesn’t feel too novel for me, necessarily, but I am proud of that,” she said. “I think one of the things we can do to increase the diversity in the field is just having more people out there who are representing different [demographics].”

Feeling “lucky” to have trained with other women in her field, DeBruin said she believes the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s diversity in its medical programming is special.

“We do have relatively good representation at the University of Wisconsin, so I was able to see these women mentors, but it’s something I think is pretty unique,” she said. “Probably not every other program or place in the country would have that same amount of representation. So, I think it’s good when we get the chance to highlight it to show people it’s an option for a career path for them, too.”

Above all else, DeBruin said she’s grateful to finally be in the position to begin caring for patients with the same level of tact and empathy her orthopedic surgeons offered her as a high school athlete.

“It’s a lot of education and training – a lot of hard work that goes into [being an orthopedic surgeon]…,” she said. “The most important thing is actually getting to take care of patients, and patients who I’m part of this community with.”