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More responses from some of our classmates who are in the health and science field. Next up I’ll be covering classmates working in the arts community or do- ing art as avocations or collecting art—please send your news!
From John Richards: “My life has been pretty boring since moving to Longview, Washington, in 1977 (after a residency at Stanford and graduating from Dartmouth Medical School in 1974) so I have never responded to the mailings from the class. There is not much exciting about having a great wife of 38 years, three amazing kids (all of whom went to the University of Washington—saving me a small fortune in tuition), two remarkable in-laws and three exceptional grandchildren. But I have found this lifestyle ideal, allowing me to pursue professional and personal goals without social chaos. After 37 years of practicing internal medicine I still enjoy going to work half time in my solo practice after 27 years of belonging to an expanding group that eventually was purchased by a large conglomerate. I can report no stunning breakthroughs and you won’t find me competing for a Nobel Prize, but I have found caring for the same people for decades to be both emotionally and intellectually satisfying. My career started with a focus on intensive, hospital-based medicine and has evolved into outpatient preventive and palliative care. I hope to stay with the program as long as my energy and intellect remain. With the emphasis on technology and finances in medicine, I strive to add some judgment and common sense to the system. I am sure that Jack Sanstead knows what I am talking about.”
From George Benz: “My connection to the health-science industry was 26 years on the commercial planning side of what ended up as GlaxoSmithKline Pharmaceuticals. I was never anything but a small cog in the big corporate ma- chinery, but it was an interesting experience and paid the bills comfortably. I worked with mostly well-intentioned, capable people working collab- oratively to launch and support pharmaceuticals that had a positive impact on patients’ lives. I man- aged to survive half a dozen rounds of corporate downsizing and mergers of equals in reaction to blockbuster drugs stumbling toward the patent cliff. I helped to launch a few bright staff up the corporate ladder. Heading toward 60 it became increasingly difficult to balance my personal in- terests against a 45-to 50-hour professional work week, it was getting harder to do the 28-mile round trip bike commute to work that I looked forward to three times a week, winter weather had long since stopped being fun and frustration at corporate politics started to outweigh the satisfaction I took from my work. Something had to give, so I had no hesitation in choosing fun when the opportunity to voluntarily retire with enhanced benefits came up. Since then I have done a little consulting, spend the worst of winter on semi-tropical Singer Island, try to cycle 100 miles a week (recently completed a Century), keep my hand in birding and Irish set dancing. Life is good. I hoped we would get to travel more, but my wife’s free time is constrained by her commitments as a much-in-demand clinical psychologist.”
Keep me posted!
12 Lummi Key, Bellevue, WA 98006; bill@drivasolutions.com
