Dr. Saunders

I'm devastated. Absolutely heartbroken. Craig's long time doctor & friend is retiring this week. He has been Craig's doctor for years and years and throughout his illness.

I am experiencing a myriad of emotions.  

His care of Craig has been incomparable, he has supported our decisions, he's walked with us through the delusions, hallucinations, hospitalizations, the memory "care" homes, he supported me in my decision to move Craig back home, expressed his praise and happiness with the incredible care Craig now receives; he has been our ROCK. I'm encountering the lost feeling of, "who's going to take care of us now?" Of course his practice partner and the ARNP they've hired will continue in Craig's care but as the article is titled below, Rob is a tough act to follow. And that's putting it mildly. Rob has been so much more than a doctor to us. We have been very richly blessed to have had this man for Craig's doctor. 

A few years ago Dr.'s Saunders and Bowers changed their practice to a concierge practice. He has been available to us 24/7 and has made numerous house calls once Craig was no longer mobile. I cannot impart enough wonderful thoughts about concierge practice; especially in Craig's illness. I do not have the words to express our gratitude and love toward this man. I cannot thank him enough for being there whenever I had a crisis with Craig's disease, for understanding my stress (I'm sure I was a thorn in his side many times) and reassuring me and Craig when he could understand. 

I'm so happy Rob is finally retiring to move on to enjoy his life of leisure and adventure. If anyone deserves it, he does. The man is phenomenal. It's as plain and simple as that.

Even though I'm feeling utterly lost, as I'm sure all of his patients are,

I'm wishing him a stress free life full of happiness!

From Sound Health Physicians blog:

Dr. Robert Saunders, a tough act to follow

By Jim Bowers

Dr. Robert Saunders has announced that he will retire from his medical practice this August. Fittingly, we wish to attempt to pay tribute to a man who has had a successful and rich career as a well respected and well loved internal medicine physician.

Dr. Saunders is a native of Seattle. He graduated from the University of Washington and received his medical degree from George Washington University in Washington, DC. He completed an internal medicine internship and residency at DC General Hospital and the Boston Veterans Administration Hospital. From 1973 to 1985, he was Chief of Intensive Care and Coronary Care at the VA Hospital in Washington, DC. He joined the Northwest Hospital medical staff in 1985. Since returning to Seattle he has been continuously on the Medical Staff at Northwest Hospital, practicing primary care with the Sand Point Internists. For eight years he also served as Medical Staff Division Chief of Medicine at Northwest Hospital. While practicing medicine his greatest joy comes from the long term relationships with his patients and their families. 

Dr. Saunders and his wife Donna Marie are the proud parents of five children and grandparents of six. They live in the North end of Seattle and enjoy their family centered lives. When not practicing medicine, he can occasionally be found nurturing his nearly lifelong passion for golf. 

Dr. Saunders plans to take time to smell the green grass of the golf links as well as pursue his passion to travel and explore.

It was my dream from the start of my medical career to practice and learn from Rob.  I am lucky to have finally done this and have enjoyed our friendship.  I hope to continue to emulate this great man and incredible physician.  He has instilled his joy of developing long term relationships with his patients and their families.  The following are excerpts of six questions I asked Rob a month before his retirement.

What has fulfilled you as a doctor, what has kept you going for the past 50 years?

It’s the incredible people I have met with and worked with that has kept me going.  This is the core of it.  I think also the opportunity to be involved in the development of (Sound Health Physicians)...I think that that is right up there with the top of the top.  I also think that with the economy evolving especially with primary care doctors I found it necessary to stay busy for a few more years.  I loved practicing medicine all along the way.  The long nights as a resident when I got my seventh admission at three in the morning was over the line, but I still loved it.  The people for the most part at the VA (Veterans Administration Hospital) and DC General (in Washington DC) were good solid people and it was a privilege to be involved in their care.  I think that this and the last five years I had the time to spend with people and I really valued that so much.  I know that this sounds preposterous, but I have no regrets...except that I didn’t take typing in high school!

You’ve seen many changes in medical care in the U.S. (Medicare and Medicaid were just starting when Dr. Saunders started as a physician); maybe you can reflect on the changes then versus the changes now that you see coming with the Health Care Reform Act

I remember when I first was accepted to medical school I thought that if I stayed the course I could have a good living.  When I was a junior in medical school I had a part time job at a private hospital in Washington, DC (The Eastern Dispensary and Casualty Hospital, a hospital that was founded to take care of those who couldn’t afford to pay for their treatment).  The founder of the hospital, Dr. Rogers (Dr. Joseph Rogers) said I was getting into medicine at the wrong time with Medicare coming (this was 1966) and doctors aren’t going to make any money.  I have seen these changes come including that doctors use to write very little (in the medical record), then the requirements started to accumulate for more documentation which was a tough nut to swallow.  There were more phases of that (through my career) and grew to like that I had to tell the story of what I observed in people in the process of taking care of them.

I can remember the head of nursing at the VA challenging me on the priorities of my profession.  I was still naive and young enough to think that the first order of business was research which was followed by teaching and then, finally, medical care.  It was the nurse who said I was wrong.  Research in this institution (VA) was the 3rd priority.  Teaching is the second priority, but the most important priority is patient care.  (She went on to say) that nurses will teach you the most about the patients.  She was absolutely right!

What do you think has been the greatest innovation in medical care since you’ve been a physician?

(pauses for awhile) Awareness that there is such a need for service and (the) changing ability because of all the innovation in medicine and surgery has got to be a huge one.  We are able to do more and provide levels of care that were unthinkable 20 or 30 years ago.  We can’t forget that we are human.

Thinking about training the next generation of healthcare providers what qualities to you wish to instill on this new generation?

I would say that listen to the people, it will be more enjoyable.  The real value that you will have is not the dollars you make but the relationships you make with others.  The sooner you come to that then the happier you will be.  It may not put you in the rich house but you will be happier.  Anything that a physician does or makes depends on the relationships he makes.

In the next twenty years the technology is changing at a logarithmic pace.  What technology or what innovation would you like to see happen?

I would like to see it become a cultural reality that individuals, people do control their healthcare to the extent that they have control over when they die or how they die.  There’s way too much effort, too much cultural push to make people stay alive longer than they want to.  I think that it may not apply to everyone all the time but when someone gets to the end of their life they should be able to control their death and not be limited by cultural barriers.

Another thing I’d like to see is we already spend a lot of money on the dying process.  I remember reading a New England Journal of Medicine article in 1973 about a man who was an alcoholic.  There was a plot of the cost of his medical care for each year of his life.  The curve was logarithmic and the curve went up and skyrocketed in his forties.  I would like to see the power of the money that goes into that (keeping people alive at the end of their life) and be redirected to the other end of the scale.

There have been people who have inspired you in your medical career.  What qualities did you learn from them?

One of the chiefs of medicine for me when I was in training and was a life coach to me, Hy Zimmmerman (Hyman Zimmerman, chief of medicine 1971-78 at Veterans Hospital in Washington DC was an early pioneer in the research of liver disease with the publication of over 100 papers over his career).  I think that he taught me to believe in myself.  To be sure that I expected that the other person on the other end is a person and not a number.  That these people had needs and had more to their lives than their disease.  Also the importance of humor.  Being able to be comfortable with oneself.  There’s so many layers of how he helped.  He could laugh at himself and laugh with everybody.

The other person is my dear Uncle Nile.  He was the first person to take an interest in me as a person.  He became a real friend.  There were many more people who influenced my life as well.  I feel very lucky with my life.  I tried to find situations where I can help other people and let them know how exciting life can be, to get engaged and expand (knowledge).  I feel lucky that I have been able to do this in my career.