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Huntington Doctors Celebrate Dr. Underman’s Distinguished Career
News Sep 15, 2016
- Courtesy photo
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(Left to Right) Drs. Wafaa Al Rashid, Trinh Tang, Luciano Gomez, Drew Pinsky, Marina Manvelyan, and Sylvia Preciado, “El Viejo” is seated. – Courtesy photo
Over 100 doctors and guests gathered at the iconic Mijares Restaurant in Pasadena this past Friday night. Their common bond was they all had trained or were teaching attendings in the Huntington Hospital Internal Medicine Residency Program.
The residency has existed since the 1950s but this occasion was to celebrate those who had trained since 1990. It was that year that Program Director Dr. Myron J. Tong M.D. Ph.D., brought Dr. Arvid Underman onto the resident teaching staff, where he has worked with the residents for more than 25 years.
For 15 years of that time he also served as the director of graduate medical education, overseeing the medicine and general surgery programs. During his remarks, he emphasized that the program could not exist without the thousands of hours spent gratis by the many voluntary attending doctors, involved in teaching the residents and helping care for their patients.
Over the past 25 years, the program has trained 157 internal medicine residents, some of whom went on to subspecialty training. Moreover the general surgery program has graduated more than 25 surgeons. Currently 68 of these doctors remain on the Huntington Hospital’s medical staff and the majority practice in the Southern California.
“The event was such an amazing turnout of esteemed colleagues and disciples to celebrate Dr. Underman’s distinguished career. He truly broke the mold of the Renaissance physician, and the love and appreciation from those attending was truly genuine. Dr. Underman has made us all better physicians and people and we are fortunate to give him our gratitude in such a heartfelt manner,” said Stratos Christianakis, M.D., associate program director of graduate medical education Huntington Memorial Hospital.
“The party was full of amazing doctors and people celebrating a medical giant. I think I speak for all of us when I say that Dr. Underman was an integral part of our medical training. He did not only teach us medicine, but he also taught us how to think outside of the box. We are all better physicians and people because of him,” said Wafaa Alrashid, M.D.
Dr. Underman grew up in the Lynwood-Compton area and graduated from Inglewood High School. He obtained both his bachelor’s and master’s from Stanford University. However he states that he never learned medicine until he joined 125 other Internal Medicine interns entering Internal Medicine Residency at LAC-USC Medical Center in 1970.
There, his role models were; Drs. John Leedom, Telford Reynolds, and Donald Feinstein. After completing his residency and fellowship in infectious diseases he joined the LAC-USC staff and later those of The Good Samaritan and Huntington Hospitals. He currently has an appointment as a clinical professor of medicine and microbiology at The Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California and is an emeritus fellow of The America College of Physicians as well as the Infectious Disease Society of America.
One former resident wrote, “When I completed residency you gave me a book called ‘Blood and Guts,’ and admitted that it was your fault that I was chosen for residency. I would like to thank you for this which allowed me to eventually become a part of the Pasadena medical community. For a lot of us, you made our residency more than just a bland educational experience. You added juice and spice to it. Our rounds together were never boring or painful. We smiled and laughed, no matter how tired and sleep deprived we felt during those morning rounds. I will always remember your kindness and attention. How can I forget the way you fixed my post-call messy hair and constantly adjusted my sometimes soiled white coat?”
After a short toast, “rare, but not overdone,” many an anecdote was exchanged. Then, at the conclusion of the party, former residents were presented with a simple pencil inscribed, “Trained by Dr. Underman.” The irony was not lost on all who must deal with the complexity of the Electronic Medical Record (EMR) on a daily basis.
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