Specialty Emergency Medicine Facility Sacramento Medical Center Department of Emergency Medicine Address 2025 Morse Avenue Sacramento CA 95825 Map & Directions Telephone (916) 973-6600 E-mail your doctor

My Path to Emergency Medicine with Kaiser Permanente

I spent my childhood years in the beautiful Bay Area before heading off to study physiology at UC Berkeley. After graduation I spent a year working with high school students at church before undertaking my medical studies at UC Davis. I walked away from Davis with an excellent education and a delightful wife. Because I had always envisioned myself as a primary care doctor, I first trained in family medicine, which I practiced for several years in California’s Central Valley. Though I enjoyed the relational side of primary care, I found the intensity and challenge of emergency medicine more rewarding. So I went back for another round of residency, this time in Seattle.

We knew that when I finished emergency training in 1999 we would be moving to Sacramento to live near my wife’s great family. We interviewed with all the emergency groups in town and were most impressed with Kaiser Permanente. Many things about the group attracted me. I loved that practicing at Kaiser Permanente would allow me the freedom to do whatever I felt was in the patient’s best interests--without the need for bureaucratic pre-approval or time-wasting authorization. Also, unlike other places I had worked, this group would let me arrange timely follow-up for my discharged patients with any specialist they needed. This would ensure that the services I provided were part of an integrated package of health care. The caliber of physicians working for Kaiser Permanente also impressed me and more so now that I’ve come to know them over the years. The health insurance coverage that my family has through Kaiser Permanente allows us to get care anywhere we like. Since no one delivers better health care than Kaiser Permanente, my family and I get our medical care right here where I work.

Why Emergency Medicine?

Some people wonder why I like practicing emergency medicine when the job can be so intense and the schedule so crazy. But this specialty seems designed to draw out the best in me. Emergency medicine requires a listening ear that is discerning and empathetic, an intelligent mind to sort out various diagnostic options, and a caring heart that provides compassion for the ill, reassurance for the anxious, and education for the perplexed. These things have made me a better person, and the better person I become, the better physician I will be. The teamwork of emergency medicine is another thing I like about this career. It is a pleasure to work side-by-side with such talented nurses, technicians, and clerks. None of us could pull this off alone. Every person has an integral part to play. It’s a privilege to be part of this winning team.

Minor Treatment Unit (MTU)

The past few years I have spent more time working in the MTU. This urgent care setting allows me to combine my family practice training with my emergency medicine experience in a less intense environment. It’s been an enjoyable change of pace.

Clinical Research

My work with Kaiser Permanente is not all conducted at the patient’s bedside for I also direct our department’s clinical research efforts. We seek to improve our understanding of various medical illnesses in order to better care for patients with those conditions. We have studied a number of clinical issues including the treatment of bladder infections, heart attacks, blood clots, drug reactions, migraine headaches, elbow injuries, and rhythm disturbances of the heart. We are also investigating several management issues like decreasing regional ambulance diversion, making urgent follow-up appointments, and expediting patient flow through the department.
Our work has been presented at both national and international conferences and has been published in a variety of medical journals and non-medical magazines, including Newsweek. Our study of the telephone management of women with bladder infections received the 2008 Morris F. Collen award for the best paper of the year by a Northern California Kaiser Permanente physician. Brief videos explain our health plan’s research activities and our bladder infection project. For a list of recent publications and active projects, please click here.

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My Credentials

Medical school	UC Davis School of Medicine, Davis, CA
Residency	Stanislaus Medical Center, Modesto, CA
Residency	Madigan Army Medical Center, Tacoma, WA
Board certification	Family Medicine, American Board of Family Medicine
Board certification	Emergency Medicine, American Board of Emergency Medicine

Disclaimer
If you think you have a MEDICAL OR PSYCHIATRIC EMERGENCY, CALL 911 IMMEDIATELY or go to the nearest hospital. DO NOT attempt to access emergency care through this web site. An emergency medical condition is a medical or psychiatric condition that manifests itself by acute symptoms of sufficient severity (including severe pain) such that you could reasonably expect the absence of immediate medical attention to result in any of the following: serious jeopardy to your health, serious impairment to your bodily functions, or serious dysfunction of any bodily organ or part. An emergency medical condition is also "active labor," which means a labor when there is inadequate time for safe transfer to a Plan hospital (or designated hospital) before delivery or if a transfer poses a threat to the health of the member or unborn child.

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