{"@context":"http://iiif.io/api/presentation/3/context.json","id":"https://centerforthehistoryoffamilymedicine.aviaryplatform.com/iiif/h12v40mx0q/manifest","type":"Manifest","label":{"en":["Dr. Kenneth Whittington"]},"logo":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/246/original/CenterForHistoryFamilyMedicine_2c_RGB.png?1773344256","metadata":[{"label":{"en":["Description"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003e Dr. Whittington came to family medicine later in life than most of the physicians interviewed. His degree was in petroleum geology, and that was his profession for the first 10+ years of his working life. During those years he was friends with a plastic surgery resident, and he accompanied him frequently when he was called to the hospital. From that exposure he became interested in medicine and at age 34 was accepted into the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine. With a wife and three children, he had to juggle many things, but he graduated in 1968. He went to work in a small family medicine practice and practiced there until his retirement in 1999. He was then asked to become the medical director for the hospital his practice was associated with, and he did that until he retired again in 2011. He was active in the Oklahoma Academy of Family Physicians, and became a delegate to the AAFP Congress of Delegates. The Oklahoma AFP asked him to run for AAFP President, which he did and won. As president, he championed equal pay for rural family physicians, worked toward recruiting more medical students into family medicine, and fought to get more family physicians out into practice. Throughout his career he was involved in many civic organizations and used his experience and expertise to contribute to his communities.\u003c/p\u003e (summary)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Rights Statement"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eThis item is protected by U.S. copyright and related rights. It is being made available by the Center for the History of Family Medicine as its rights-holder for noncommercial use, including sharing and adapting the work. No permission is required for noncommercial use so long as attribution is provided. All other uses require permission from the Center for the History of Family Medicine.  Disclaimer: The views presented in this broadcast are the speaker’s own and do not represent those of CHFM or the AAFP Foundation. The information presented is for general, educational, or entertainment purposes and should not be considered legal, health, financial, or other advice. \u003c/p\u003e"]}},{"label":{"en":["Date"]},"value":{"en":["2013-11-14 (created)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Type"]},"value":{"en":["Oral History"]}},{"label":{"en":["Agent"]},"value":{"en":["Sandy Panther (Interviewer)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Format"]},"value":{"en":["audio file"]}},{"label":{"en":["Keyword"]},"value":{"en":["family medicine","family physician","American Academy of Family Physicians","Oklahoma","American Academy of Family Physicians President"]}},{"label":{"en":["Subject"]},"value":{"en":["Kenneth Whittington, MD (personal name)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Language"]},"value":{"en":["English (primary)"]}}],"summary":{"en":["\u003cp\u003e\u0026nbsp;Dr. Whittington came to family medicine later in life than most of the physicians interviewed. His degree was in petroleum geology, and that was his profession for the first 10+ years of his working life. During those years he was friends with a plastic surgery resident, and he accompanied him frequently when he was called to the hospital. From that exposure he became interested in medicine and at age 34 was accepted into the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine. With a wife and three children, he had to juggle many things, but he graduated in 1968. He went to work in a small family medicine practice and practiced there until his retirement in 1999. He was then asked to become the medical director for the hospital his practice was associated with, and he did that until he retired again in 2011. He was active in the Oklahoma Academy of Family Physicians, and became a delegate to the AAFP Congress of Delegates. The Oklahoma AFP asked him to run for AAFP President, which he did and won. As president, he championed equal pay for rural family physicians, worked toward recruiting more medical students into family medicine, and fought to get more family physicians out into practice. Throughout his career he was involved in many civic organizations and used his experience and expertise to contribute to his communities.\u003c/p\u003e"]},"requiredStatement":{"label":{"en":["Attribution"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eThis item is protected by U.S. copyright and related rights. It is being made available by the Center for the History of Family Medicine as its rights-holder for noncommercial use, including sharing and adapting the work. No permission is required for noncommercial use so long as attribution is provided. All other uses require permission from the Center for the History of Family Medicine. \u0026nbsp;Disclaimer: The views presented in this broadcast are the speaker\u0026rsquo;s own and do not represent those of CHFM or the AAFP Foundation. The information presented is for general, educational, or entertainment purposes and should not be considered legal, health, financial, or other advice.\u0026nbsp;\u003c/p\u003e"]}},"provider":[{"id":"https://centerforthehistoryoffamilymedicine.aviaryplatform.com/aboutus","type":"Agent","label":{"en":["Center for the History of Family Medicine"]},"homepage":[{"id":"https://centerforthehistoryoffamilymedicine.aviaryplatform.com/","type":"Text","label":{"en":["Center for the History of Family Medicine"]},"format":"text/html"}],"logo":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/246/original/CenterForHistoryFamilyMedicine_2c_RGB.png?1773344256","type":"Image"}]}],"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/public/images/audio-default.png","type":"Image","format":"image/png"}],"items":[{"id":"https://centerforthehistoryoffamilymedicine.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2195/collection_resources/154863/file/284022","type":"Canvas","label":{"en":["Media File 1 of 1 - Whittington_Kenneth_13_a.wav"]},"duration":3355.87205,"width":640,"height":360,"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/public/images/audio-default.png","type":"Image","format":"image/png"}],"items":[{"id":"https://centerforthehistoryoffamilymedicine.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2195/collection_resources/154863/file/284022/content/1","type":"AnnotationPage","items":[{"id":"https://centerforthehistoryoffamilymedicine.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2195/collection_resources/154863/file/284022/content/1/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"painting","body":{"id":"https://aviary-p-centerforthehistoryoffamilymedicine.s3.wasabisys.com/collection_resource_files/resource_files/000/284/022/original/Whittington_Kenneth_13_a.wav?1754491030","type":"Audio","format":"audio/wav","duration":3355.87205,"width":640,"height":360},"target":"https://centerforthehistoryoffamilymedicine.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2195/collection_resources/154863/file/284022","metadata":[]}]}],"annotations":[{"id":"https://centerforthehistoryoffamilymedicine.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2195/collection_resources/154863/file/284022/transcript/82281","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["Dr. Whittington interview transcript [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://centerforthehistoryoffamilymedicine.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2195/collection_resources/154863/file/284022/transcript/82281/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Good afternoon Dr. Whittington.\n\nGood afternoon. \n\nI would like you to start out when you were born with sort of an historical background before you became a physician. When you were born, where you were born, your parents’ names, what they did for a living, siblings, grandchildren. Sort of give us a background of where you went to grade school, high school. And you just go as long as you want and then I shall interject questions or follow-up information.\n\nI was born in Amarillo, Texas, February 3, 1934. And that’s before we had calendars so…I went to grade school in Amarillo. My mother and my grandmother raised me. She was a divorced lady. And thank heavens I had those two because they were really something special. My mother did remarry when I was a sophomore in high school and my stepfather was a very influential, a very smart man, brilliant man training-wise, etc. He was a school superintendent and teacher. Then I went to Amarillo High School which was the only high school there in Amarillo at that time. The largest high school in the state of Texas at that time and that’s the reason it was number one. They had to have something to brag about. Then went to Amarillo College there, a little junior college in Amarillo. And I was there for one year and then went to Texas Tech in Lubbock. I graduated from there in 1956 and my degree was Bachelor of Science in Petroleum Geology. My mother had been a dental assistant for the same doctor for I guess fifty years and that’s the closest thing I had to training, that anybody ever said anything, that was close to medicine. Anyway, geology was what I graduated in and Phillips Petroleum Company came on campus and interviewed me and hired me. And I worked for Phillips and they sent me back to Amarillo for a two-month training session. Then I was transferred to Ardmore, Oklahoma and I was a geologist for Phillips there for two years. And Phillips, as big companies always did, they would either expand and centralize or decide to spread out where we were spread out into a little field office. And they decided they were going to bring everybody to Oklahoma City, so we were moved to Oklahoma City. At that time, I was in town about half the time and out on wells about half the time. But we were going to a small Presbyterian church that was there in Oklahoma City and had close friends, a couple that he was in his residency in plastic surgery. And we would get together on weekends and play bridge. About the time we would start to play bridge, Jim would get a call from a patient and we would have to go to the hospital. I would go with him each time. Then I found myself even talking vigorously about that, the possibility of medical school. He kept urging that. And I didn’t think there was a way in the world that could ever happen because by that time I had acquired a lady friend, Alice, and we were married in the church, by the way. Shotgun close by but…and we had three children. So that sounded kind of impossible to be able to go back to school, particularly to medical school. But we had a spiritual renewal in our little church and Billy Graham’s son-in-law, Layton Ford, came there for about a week’s worth of Bible study and things. It was then that I decided I would try to go to medical school. And what I knew about medical school was absolutely nothing, but we took that challenge on. At that time I was in Oklahoma City and the University of Oklahoma Medical School is in Oklahoma City. So I went out to the medical school and I can remember getting an appointment to meet with the Dean of Men. I went in and met with him, a very nice gentleman. And he said what in the world do you want to do? I said I want to actually come out here and start medical school. He said, do you not know how we do these things? I said no, sir, I don’t. He said well, you would have to apply and go through personal interviews and written interviews. I said but sir, you don’t really understand, I’m thirty-four (I believe that’s the age I was at the time)_ and I have a wife and three children and still have to go to work and we’ll have to do something with the kids. He said, I’m sorry, sir, but that’s the only thing we can do. So I said oh, boy. Jim kept after me, so I’d hang out with him and work with him a lot and it just became more solidified that that’s what I wanted to do. So I got the papers to work on and I did those and I had an interview that was set up for one evening, a panel of four doctors. They interviewed me and I found out how dumb I really was. They told me that they would put their heads together and I’d be getting a report in the mail. So I left with hopes of something to happen. And I got a letter that said thank you for applying. You’ve been put on the third list, meaning that if they couldn’t get enough people to fill their classes, they would dip down there and get some from there. And lo and behold, that did happen. I never thought that would be, but it did. So I got to go to school that next year. Alice had to find a job and her degree from Texas Tech was in botany and she got a job down at the University of Oklahoma in Norman working for a botany professor there. And she would drive twenty miles every day to Norman and had her job with her professor. And that still left something to do with the three kids. And we had a lady in our church, she had five kids of her own, which seemed to me like a handful. But she was willing for us to drop the girls off at her house early in the mornings. I would go to school and the girls would go to school by their house. And then they’d go to Virginia’s house after school. And she fed them breakfast and dinner and we would pick them up any time from 6:00 to, I guess, 7:00 at night. And we did that for four years and even survived it.  \n\nI enjoyed medical school. I was the oldest member of our class. And our class had two or three other gentlemen that were older than the regular school students and it was kind of a new thing for the university to try this. And I hate to say that our class, we lost all four of those older people. They didn’t make it. I must have slid down low enough in my seat where they didn’t have a good shot at me. But we got through it and I could learn all the material. It just simply took me maybe four hours to do what those young kids would do in an hour and a half or two hours. So I just prevailed by working harder and longer hours, I guess. My friend, the plastic surgeon, worked with me all the time saying Ken, you’ve got to learn everything. He said don’t let people tell you. When they say you’ve got to draw blood for this test, something you’d say get the lab to draw the blood. You get in there and you draw the blood and you talk to the families. So I got good instruction from him which I really appreciated later in my practice because a lot of times you were called on to do things that the lab couldn’t get or the nurse couldn’t. So it was a big, big help. I never looked at it what we called scut work there in medical school. I felt it was very important to do and I would make sure I would take as much of anything that my classmates didn’t want to do. And the same thing on delivering babies. When we got to the clinical years, I would take all of them I could get. And some classmates did not want to participate in the OB thing and I would just take all their cases, as much as I could do. But very fortunate and lucky that I was even there. I did graduate in spite of probably most people’s questions about that.  \n\nI graduated in 1968 from medical school. Alice thought that’s great, so she quit work and the kids came back home essentially. And so we kind of restarted everything again. Then we had to make a decision when we graduated what we wanted to do. And I decided that our church was there in Oklahoma City and the kids were growing up there and I essentially had too, so we just stayed there in Oklahoma City. And I interviewed with several different doctors, practice groups that were looking for somebody to come out and help them. And I went to work in a group of five out in Bethany, Oklahoma, on the west side of Oklahoma City. And went to work there with the doctors and really enjoyed my practice there. And they were always helpful and encouraging – and everybody needs some kind of encouragement. But it was just a wonderful situation. So I practiced there at Bethany until about the time when hospitals started wanting to hire doctors so they could get the doctors to put their people in their hospital. And none of us really wanted to do that. We didn’t think that was what we wanted to do. We had one young lady that came about three or four years after I started out there and she really was interested in being hired by a hospital. The rest of us were not, but we agreed to do it so we could keep our little practice group together. So we hired out to one of the hospitals in Oklahoma City and didn’t have to move or anything. We stayed right there in Bethany. We worked there until 1999, about the time I decided I had to do something because I was ready to make a change. I decided maybe you better just retire, as old as I was. So I retired and thought I would just hang it up. So I announced my retirement and they had a nice little reception for me. And I thought that’s what you’re supposed to do, work until you’re old and then retire and enjoy it. Well, I’m not sure whether I really did enjoy it. About the second day after “retirement,” I got a call from one of the other hospitals where I did all my practice. I always took my patients to that hospital. And they called me and said, would you come talk to the administrator tomorrow? And I said, well, is he lonesome? So I went to see what he had up his sleeve. And he said what I need is you to become the medical director at the hospital. And I was just flabbergasted. It was the small hospital that I’d always practiced in and I always looked at it as my hospital. And I told him that and he said the way I look at it, this is my hospital too. So I said, I guess we have to do joint ownership then. So they hired me to come on staff to be the medical director. I didn’t have a practice and was just an administrator trying to get doctors to come to the hospital and to work with the doctors. The way we looked at it, I was kind of the person to help the doctor when there were problems or whatever else that needed to be done. So I just worked with him. And I did that until March of 2011. And I had a stroke that started and got up that morning and Alice said what’s wrong. And I said I had a little bit of a headache but I’m going to the hospital. So I went to my office. By the time I got to my office, I had run into four or five people in the hallways and they’d say, you don’t feel good, why don’t you go to the ER. I had forgotten something at home and I came back home to pick it up and Alice said you’ve got to go to the doctor. She said you’re not talking clearly and your face is all screwed up. That was the nicest thing she’s ever said about my face! But I went to the ER and the doctor met me there. And sure enough, I’d had a little stroke. It wasn’t a horrible one, I guess, but I can’t imagine it being any more horrible than what it had been. So that took me out and left the job. And by the time I kind of got out of the hospital and rehab and things there, they decided it might be best if I just go ahead and retire. So I did step away from the hospital at that time. And it’s just been an ongoing recovery thing since that time. The things that kind of started taking hold were the things I liked going to. I belonged to and was President of many of the medical associations, etc. and so I spent time doing that. And now I’m here talking to you on the phone. \n\nLet me go back just a little bit. Were you an only child?\n\nYes, ma’am, I was an only child. I suppose they said, once I came, for goodness sakes, who wants another one? So I was raised by my grandmother and my aunt and my mother as an only child, yes, ma’am. \n\nTell me a little bit about your children and grandchildren and what they’re doing. Their names and what they’re doing.\n\nWe have three children. Our first child was Linda. She went to college, then started her own little oil company and has pretty much retired from that as of now. But she still kind of keeps her hand in the thing. Our second child was another young girl. I guess they’re young when they’re born though, aren’t they?  \n\nThey are young when they’re born, yes.\n\nAnd Nancy went away to TCU in Fort Worth and became a diagnostician and has her own little private practice that she runs in Dallas for families that had children that wanted to go away to the Ivy League schools. She had classes and worked with them and trained them how to take the test and which school they wanted to get into. And she got a bunch of them in at different times, different places. And the people there in Dallas really appreciated that, so they kept her busy all the time. Then our third child was a son. Don’t know where he came from! I believe he was born in ’69. And he went to OU and was an accounting major. He went to work for a company as an accountant, which I thought was kind of neat. The company he went to work for was the company that I was on the board and we started our own professional liability company. So that was interesting. And I worked with them there. Then he has since, the fellow that owned that company asked him to come to work for him at one of his small, little companies. And he did that and took it over and has grown the thing. And now he has been the president and was asked to be one of the owners. So he’s done that and selling bonds to contractors that have to be bonded, I guess, when they do work for the cities and the things like that. So he sells insurance bonds. And he’s done very, very well. \n\nAnd you have three grandchildren. Is that correct?\n\nYes. My oldest daughter never married. And then Nancy, the middle girl that’s down in Dallas, has a son who is 28 years old now. And he’s an economics major at North Texas University in Dallas. And then Ken has two girls. Sarah is 23 and she graduated from Oklahoma State University last year in accounting and now is working for an accounting company here in Oklahoma City and they’re allowing her to work on a master’s degree, I guess a doctorate degree, but would actually be a CPA by the time she gets that. She’s [Allison] 20 years old now and she’s a sophomore at OSU.   \n\nSo your second granddaughter is Allison and she’s still a student? \n\nYes, she is. She’ll graduate in two years, I guess. \n\nThat’s great. Tell me a little bit about the politics you were involved in. You obviously started with the Oklahoma chapter and received some nice awards there but were involved also in the politics. Can you take us through a little bit, the Oklahoma Academy and then the national Academy?\n\nProbably a little bit anyway. Yes, ma’am. My dad always said look, you’ve got to repay things, the taxpayers and things that have supported you and got you through colleges and certainly medical school. So he pounded it into me pretty well that you need to be paying back to the people that allowed you to do what you wanted to do. And so I did that when I started my practice. Immediately I had gone to the Oklahoma Academy of Family Physicians and worked with them and tried to [    ] and their offices were in Oklahoma City, so it kind of made it handy. I could just slip by there at different times or whatever. If they had something that needed to be done, they would call me and we’d see if we couldn’t get it figured out some way. So I just started with that with Harl Stokes. You may remember that name. \n\nOh, I do remember Harl.\n\nAnd Harl was our Executive Director and his wife Bettye. So it was like one big family with us for awhile there. So I ended up on the Board of Directors of the Oklahoma Academy of Family Physicians for three or four years. And they decided that maybe they needed somebody to run for the Board of Directors of the American Academy. And we had had one, a long, long time ago. And Sandy, I’m blocking on who that was, the President of the AAFP.  \n\nI’m drawing a blank also.\n\n[C.] Riley Strong, that was it. But no one else was active and really going to national Academy meetings. So I started going there and I really enjoyed it there. Wonderful people like you and Erica (?) and told what we needed to do and how to do it and when to do it. So I just fell right in. I thought it was a perfect thing.  \n\nIt looks like you came onto the Academy in 1981 as an alternate delegate.\n\nI think that’s right, 1981. And I met a lot of people there. I enjoyed meeting people and a lot of very nice and helpful people. Particularly, I will say Jim Jones who turned out to be a Past President of the Academy. And Harry Metcalf, Bill Cleveland, were all there and always kind of supportive of things I was doing. And I just kept hanging out with them and it just seemed like to move on up and try to be President of the silly thing. That was kind of the thing, when the Oklahoma Academy came to me and said we want you to run for President. I said that’s the craziest thing you ever thought of. I never would make that. But I told them I was willing to try, so we undertook that. And because they were good at how they ran everything, I was fortunate enough to win that and become Academy President – which I’ve always honored and thought was probably the highest thing I’ve ever done. \n\nWhat were some of the key issues at the time you were President?\n\nA couple of things. One, we weren’t getting enough people coming out into family practice. And many reasons why, because they didn’t pay the family physician doctors very much. Insurance didn’t. And coming from a rural state, they paid our rural doctors even less than they paid doctors in a metropolitan area. So I always felt that was absolutely horrible that they weren’t paying them the same thing. They worked as hard or harder and things cost as much or more there. So I always was thumping the table for getting equal pay for those guys and gals that were out there working hard. Then, of course, the other thing was we couldn’t get a lot of the medical schools to even have a family practice program. So we were trying to encourage the different states, the different programs to either enlarge their residency programs or expand them. Or if they didn’t have one, to get one started. So that was one of the things early on that we did, a lot of work trying to get not only the pay equal and things but to get schools to have a residency program so we could finally get more doctors out. And that was a big, big fight for a long time. Somewhat, it was an internal battle at the Academy level for practicing doctors versus professors or medical school instructors and things. The academics versus the practicing doctor. And there was a pretty good little tiff going on there for a time. And I was very much against that and felt what we needed was practicing doctors out there and we didn’t need any more doctors in academia. So that’s what I kind of really fought for, for a long time.  \n\nYou have also been involved in many service organizations and had been honored, obviously, in 2010, they named a lounge after you at Deaconess Hospital. And you were Family Physician of the Year in Oklahoma. And that’s a huge honor. Are there specific volunteer activities you’ve been involved in that you’re particularly proud of?\n\nThere was a little children’s center in Bethany, Oklahoma that took care of kids from the university when they were delivered and they were absolutely just left in a bed to die simply because they were so bad off medically and we didn’t have any way to really help them. And this little hospital was run by a brother and sister and they were just the most fantastic people I ever ran into. And they cared for these little kids. And there was no question about that, they were terminal, they were not going to live and go home with any parents or anything. But we took them and they loved them and nursed them. And that little place was just a marvelous thing to see. And it was an awful facility, wooden buildings that didn’t have oxygen in it – and all of them needed oxygen. So we just had portable oxygen bottles that we had to take to each bedside. I was on the board of directors of that for a number of years. When I was President of the board, and we made a decision that we were going to try to get a building grant so we could build a building that would at least have oxygen in the walls where we could take care of these kids.  \n\nIt was kind of interesting, another little side story. When we were in Ardmore working for Phillips, the only thing to do in that little town was play bridge. So there were always bridge things every night, it seemed like and I met a young man there who played bridge in a group we were in. And he worked for a different oil company there than Phillips, but I got to know him fairly well. Then when we moved to the city, we quit all that. And in all truthfulness, most all of that kind of went to the back of my mind and I don’t really think we did anything. But when we decided to try to find a grant, the company that had some money was out of Tulsa, Oklahoma. There were big signs on the interstate highways and things and had a big company and they had a lot of money that they were putting out. So we applied for a $5 million grant. And for our little hospital, we thought we aren’t going to get anything like that. But we had to have it. One day I get a call in Oklahoma City and the guy who came on said he was from Tulsa, Oklahoma. He reminded me about us playing bridge together there in Ardmore probably twenty years before that. And he said, I just thought maybe you would know something about that hospital. I said, yes, I do. I said, I’m President of the board. So I gave him my song and dance about the hospital and what-have-you. And lo and behold, we did it, we got the grant.  \n\n \n\nOh, my, so you got exactly what you asked for.\n\nYes, ma’am. \n\nThat’s fabulous.\n\nAnd they continued it and that’s been so amazing. \n\nNot many people have the opportunity to become passionate about something. And when you do and you’re able to succeed in seeing another organization become successful. Quite honestly, in all my years of doing this, I’ve not seen anyone who has given back in more civic organizations that you have. The professional organizations, like being part of the AMA, the medical society in Oklahoma, those you sort of generally see through a biographical sketch of someone. But you really have been involved in a huge number of civic organizations.\n\nYes, ma’am. Of course, the state medical association I was very deeply involved in but they were so different than the Academy. Just so different.  \n\nAnd how long were you involved with that medical association?\n\nUntil the last year I was still serving on the board or what-have-you. I never ran for President. The Academy was just my life back then. But I did everything with them and still do because that’s where most of my doctors are, in state medical. It has a large number of family physicians. \n\nI would like to ask a couple of philosophical questions. Have you seen huge changes over the years in family medicine?\n\nYes, ma’am. I think so anyway. A lot of places, you couldn’t go in practice. They wanted a subspecialist. You know, they wanted cardiologists, they wanted somebody. And we spent a lot of time, which I don’t regret at all, proving ourselves that we were trained to handle the entire family and then be able to get them to the subspecialist as was needed, you know, and make proper referrals. So I developed from somebody that they didn’t even think of, that was just an old country doctor that would see them in the office or something, which we did all that. But if they needed surgical things and we hadn’t been trained on any of that, we sent them to the proper subspecialist and made sure that they got the care that they needed. The thing I miss, Sandy, about being retired is the patients. I had the greatest patients in the world.  \n\nAnd that goes across the board with every interview I’ve done – when the physician is retired, as you have, missing the patient contact and being able to sense the family, know the family, know the kids and know, in many cases, the grandchildren. \n\nYou felt like you were part of their family. They wanted you to be making decisions they needed to be making.  \n\nHopefully not a hard question, but what achievement are you most proud of in your lifetime?\n\nI would have to almost say the President of the American Academy of Family Physicians. \n\nI thought that was going to be your answer. And you were a good one from the perspective of a physician, but also from the perspective of the staff. You were always so kind to all of us. \n\nThe staff was just so good. And Mike Miller and Dan [Ostergaard] were always my closest friends. Then Mike died and I went to speak to him, I did the same thing as I’m doing to you. \n\nWell, he was a special person. We were in Physicians with Heart when that happened. Dan flew back but the rest of us couldn’t. \n\nWhere is your sense of where family medicine is going to go in the future with all of the healthcare changes?\n\nWell, what I think we’ll see is they will be cut out of the financial end of the thing and pushed down and we’re going to almost have to start back all over again, it looks like to me, nationally. Trying to make sure with the medical schools, that they still have programs for family physicians and that they get the proper training to prove that they can do that kind of work. I think it’s going to be a reopening of our past. I really do. I hate to say that but…\n\nI do too. I think there’s been a loss of respect for family medicine over the last couple of years.\n\nI’m nearing the end of my questions. Is there anything in particular you would like to put on this tape that we may not have covered?\n\nThe only thing I can think really, Sandy, is now that I’ve moved on from being President of the Academy and all, we still have our little group. We have two groups that I belong to, the Past Presidents and things that get together once a year still. And it’s the highlight of our year always, to go to whoever is having the meeting that year. To go there and get to see and be with our old friends. \n\nWhich two groups are you in?\n\n[Alice Whittington]: The Ex Officios. Most of them were before Ken. \n\nI was the youngster there. And The HUNS[former AAFP Board member group]. \n\nThe HUNS. Because Dick and I have been to several of those and I thought we used to get together at those. \n\nThat one I’m the old man in probably. And then the Ex Officios I don’t know if that’s my favorite but…\n\nI’ll tell you what I am going to do now, because I am finished, unless there is something else you want to say. But what will happen, the process that will occur on this is Don will transcribe these tapes. You’ll get copies of these tapes. And then we put a copy in the Center for the History. But as you think back, or Alice, as you think back, if there are sections that you think you forgot today, just write them down and let us know and we will set up an addendum to the tape. Because with all of the magic of this day and age, we can just fit it right on the backend of it. Because you probably will get off and think, oh, I should have mentioned this or I wish I would have mentioned this organization I worked with. So this is a living tape, so you can call back at any time and let us know and we’ll set up another short session on this and go through whatever it is you would like to discuss.\n\nThe only other thing that came to mind is that in the American Academy of Family Physicians, while we were all delegates and then officers, etc., our kids would go to the meetings. So they developed a friendship sometimes with some of the other doctors and sometimes even their kids and things. And it’s just like one big family.  \n\nIt is. Always has been. You know, I did two other medical associations after I left here, as a consultant, never had the rapport that you have through this organization. There’s a dedication with the family physician. A dedication to the specialty that you don’t see in any of the others. So I’m very blessed to have worked for 35 years and you worked longer than that with them. I’m just delighted that we had an opportunity to do this.\n\nWell, you’re really a big part of it. \n\nWell, thank you. I’m a very small cog, but I’m still going. At the age of 71, by golly, I’m still doing this. So it’s fun. And I wish there was an opportunity to see you all again. The HUNS are nice enough to invite us every year, so it has just been…We had the chance to do it in the recent past. So maybe we will do this again someday. \n\nYour husband, Dick, we went to dinner in Florida at that time. We just loved that. \n\nOh, yes, that was fun. \n\nIt was good. \n\nI’m thrilled any time I get to see somebody. If you’re ever in Florida, we’ve got ample room now to entertain you. You can come stay with us. We would love to have you do that. And we have several who seem to come through every year, and we have fun with every one of them. So truly, I mean this, if you’re down there, there’s no reason…We’re in Naples and we have adequate room for everybody. And it’s just fun for us to show our new home, Naples, to people. \n\nThank you both so much. This has been absolutely my thrill. And again, please, if you think of something else, just give me a call and we can do this. I don’t have to be in Kansas City. I can be in Florida and you can be in Oklahoma and we can do an addendum.\n\nVery good. Thank you very much Sandy. I apologize I wasn’t here. \n\nIt actually worked out well because Alice could get me your CV so that I was current and I can always refer to that, which prompts more questions. \n\nIt’s really not current. \n\nWell, I know. That’s the unfortunate thing. But it was current enough that it filled in some gaps for me. \n\nYou all take care. We’ll get you a copy of this. And if you have any questions whatsoever, you can call Don Ivey or myself or email me and we will keep in touch. \n\nThank you very much.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://centerforthehistoryoffamilymedicine.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2195/collection_resources/154863/file/284022#t=0.0,3355.87205"}]}]}]}