Recipients of Outstanding Physician Awards by the Medical Board of California
2004:
Individual physician: Jacob Eapen, M.D. is a pediatrician for Alameda County Health Services where he treats children and juveniles in the county's retention center in San Leandro. He has spent his entire professional career caring for uninsured and poor patients throughout the world. He has taught and practiced in Nigeria; was appointed Health Advisor by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to the Republic of the Philippines where he worked with refugees in Battan; and served as the Director of International Affairs for Stop AIDS Worldwide, where he met Mother Theresa in Calcutta to promote the work of this organization. In 1990 he was appointed Director for Research and Public Health Programs at International Health Services in Mountain View, California.
Physician group: "Kids Care/Community ENT" is a volunteer partnership of approximately 25 physicians from Orange and Shasta counties. These family practitioners, ENTs, and anesthesiologists provided surgical attention to low-income children in the Redding area of California who had waited as long as two years for tonsillectomies, placement of ear-drainage tubes, and other medical procedures. Most of these children had been unable to hear, smell or speak normally. From December 2000 to February 2003, the "Kids Care" physicians and other healthcare workers treated approximately 166 children. This creative partnership resulted from a shortage of pediatric specialists in Redding, in part due to low Medi-Cal reimbursement rates.
2005:
Individual physician: Appannagari "Dev" GnanaDev, M.D. is a surgeon from Colton. Dr. GnanaDev is the Medical Director and Chairman of the Department of Surgery at Arrowhead Regional Medical Center (ARMC). His commitment to the underserved spans 23 years of work in a public hospital setting. In the mid-1990s, he spearheaded a grassroots campaign to win approval for a new, state-of-the-art hospital that would replace the existing county hospital, which had fallen into disrepair. In 1999, the 373-bed Medical Center in Colton opened, providing the residents of San Bernardino County with one of the most modern healthcare facilities in the world. He also established a free tattoo-removal program for former gang members in 1996, and in 2003 worked to create the Inland Empire Burn Institute to aid burn victims in the Inland Empire.
Physician group: "Sacramento Physicians' Initiative to Reach out, Innovate, and Teach (SPIRIT) Hernia Repair Program." The SPIRIT hernia-repair physicians are part of a non-profit organization of 40 active, volunteer physicians who seek to improve access to healthcare for Sacramento County's working poor who do not receive benefits through their employer and who cannot afford to buy health insurance, yet who are ineligible for Medi-Cal. The SPIRIT physicians pre-operatively and post-operatively evaluate these patients in their private offices, and operate on them with the full cooperation of their hospitals, which assist their efforts by donating necessary support services and staff. After their surgeries, most of the patients are able to return to work to support themselves and their families.
2006:
Individual physician: Craig Jones, M.D. is an allergist from Los Angeles. Dr. Jones is the chief of the Division of Allergy and Immunology, Department of Pediatrics, at the Los Angeles County + University of Southern California Medical Center. He is the director of the center's Allergy/Immunology Residency Training Program. To help combat asthma in children, Dr. Jones, with the Asthma & Allergy Foundation of America, Southern California Chapter, developed the concept of the Breathmobile program, which he serves as its volunteer medical director. The Breathmobile is an asthma clinic on wheels, and brings free treatment and medicine to disadvantaged children at over 120 schools, resulting in significantly fewer emergency room visits, and a dramatic decrease in school absenteeism. The Breathmobile is the first project in the country to exclusively treat children with asthma at their school site. Each Breathmobile is staffed by a team from the Division of Allergy and Immunology at LAC +USC, visits about 20 targeted schools every six weeks, and enrolls about 1,000 new patients per year.
Individual physician: Ramon Jimenez, M.D. is an orthopedic surgeon from Salinas and Monterey. He is a senior orthopedic consultant with Monterey Orthopedic and Sports Medicine Institute. In the last 30 years, he has worked to improve access to healthcare for farm workers and the Latino population in the Central Valley and Mexico. He grew up in San Jose, where he worked as an orthopedist in a practice that was almost half Latino. He still serves on the Board of Trustees for National Hispanic University, where he mentors young people to guide them in their careers and education. He returns to Guadalajara annually to provide arthroscopic procedures and total joint replacements to those who otherwise would not have access to these necessary medical services. He also has worked on the state and federal level to sensitize physicians treating multicultural patients -- an issue of particular interest to the Medical Board. He has been involved with diversity issues for the American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons for the past eight years and is the Chairman of their Diversity Advisory Board.
2007:
Individual physician: Dr. Clyde Ikeda is a plastic and reconstructive surgeon from San Francisco. He is a team leader of "Hospital de la Familia," a group of volunteer doctors and nurses, 109 of whom are California physicians. He has been on its board of directors since 1996 and serves as its medical director and vice president. This charitable medical organization provides services four times a year to a hospital in Guatemala. Since 1976, volunteers in this small hospital have treated nearly 290,000 patients. Dr. Ikeda performs reconstructive and plastic surgery on many patients, especially children. In addition, he developed one of the foremost burn centers in Northern California, the Bothin Burn Center (opened in 1967); was on the board of the St. Vincent de Paul Society in San Francisco; and volunteers his time to teach residents in plastic surgery at St. Francis Memorial Hospital.
Individual physician: Dr. Ron Bangasser died on May 2, 2007 of colorectal cancer. His death is a loss not only for his family and friends, but also for the patient population of Redlands. He was a family practitioner and the director of the Wound Care Center at Redlands Community Hospital. He introduced hyperbaric chambers to the wound-care ward at that hospital in 1982, and that unit now treats more than 4,000 patients a year. He was a member of numerous organized-medicine associations and societies, and participated in causes ranging from domestic violence awareness to the United Way. He was an outspoken advocate of access to medical care for all, regardless of income, and participated in medical organizations where his voice could be heard. For two decades served as team physician for San Bernardino Valley College and the San Bernardino Stampede Professional Baseball team.
