• Published in: Voices of NY

While many American doctors live in McMansions in the suburbs, Leonid Isakov, A pediatrician with 16 years of experience in his home country, lives with his wife and two children in a  $700-a-month apartment in Midwood.

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After he arrived from Uzbekistan in 2001, Isakov studied night after night to become certified as a doctor in the United States, then scrimped and saved to open his clinic in Sheepshead Bay with another doctor eight years later.

“I don’t have a house, I don’t have a car even,” said Isakov, 47. “Whatever I had, I invested to this place… I have approximately half a day to spend with my kids…per week.”

But for Isakov — as for many other immigrant entrepreneurs — this sacrifice is the key to his business success.

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