Alumni in the News
12/10/2009
Best Doctors in Baltimore Alumni of Cardinal Gibbons
By Michael Reeb
There are more than a few things that Dr. James Richardson and Dr. Dennis Smith have in common.
They both graduated from medical school around the same time.
They both practice at St. Agnes Hospital, Dr. Richardson in geriatric and family medicine and Dr. Smith in pulmonary medicine, internal medicine and critical care.
And they both graduated from Cardinal Gibbons.
After all these years, it’s nice to have the both of you as neighbors. The pleasure, as they say, is truly ours.
Meet James Richardson, Cardinal Gibbons Class of 1972, and Dennis Smith, Gibbons Class of 1969.
“All through my education, from elementary school to Cardinal Gibbons, to UMBC for college, to the University of Maryland Medical School, to my Masters in Public Health at Johns Hopkins . . . you can go from any of those places to the other in 20 minutes,” says Dr. Richardson, 55. “That’s not too common for most physicians these days.”
And these days, Dr. Richardson has become increasingly involved in geriatric medicine, a specialty that he began to pursue in earnest in the mid to late 1980s.
“That’s the time geriatrics was being recognized in the United States,” he says. “It has been in Britain for a while, but it was slower coming to the U.S.”
Not coincidentally, Dr. Richardson, who writes a column for the community publication Generations in Howard County, says of his fellow alumni from Gibbons: “We’re of the age that a lot of them are retired. It’s hard to believe.”
That’s certainly not true for Dr. Richardson, who on the day we visited had just returned from St. Elizabeth’s Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, which is adjacent to St. Agnes Hospital.
“I recently had a very fulfilling experience with the family of a patient at St. Agnes who had metastatic cancer,” he says. “They asked me to see him because the family was not interested in subjecting him to therapy that wouldn’t help but his family was interested in helping him transition to hospice. I made some changes to his pain medicines and a few other suggestions and he became much more comfortable.”
“His family was really appreciative, and I was honored to have been able to contribute to his care at the end of his life.”
Dr. Smith is similarly concerned with providing his patients with care that makes a difference.
“I think some of my most satisfying moments [in medicine] came when I was able to pinpoint the symptoms either undiagnosed or misdiagnosed by primary care physicians,” Dr. Smith says. “What’s also rewarding, but leaves an emotional scar, is being able to help the terminally ill. I frequently deal with patients with lung cancer.
“It’s like an avocation to me, [but] knowing at the same time that I have to give some patients bad news initially is tough.”
Making a difference clearly is something that also matters to Dr. Richardson.
“These days, I do a lot of geriatric medicine,” he says. “What I really like about geriatric medicine is that the older patients are so appreciative. You don’t always change, but you can really make a difference in the quality of life. It’s nice to make a difference. As Tom Brokaw has said: ‘They’re really the greatest generation.’ I really enjoy helping them make the best of their years.”
Some of Dr. Richardson’s best years began right here at Cardinal Gibbons.
“I did appreciate going to school with both kids who were college-bound,” he says, “and kids who were just glad to be in school. It was nice to have that mix.”
“I had great teachers, like Mr. Lang, Mr. Adams, Fr. Bechtel,” Dr. Richardson says. “I loved Fr. Bechtel – he was a hoot. I loved being in the chorus of South Pacific. That was the highlight of my musical career.”
Dr. Smith says: “I was in the fourth graduating class [at Gibbons]. Already you could tell there was a family atmosphere that was taking over.”
That was particularly important to him and his family because, when his father succumbed to heart disease at the age of 33, his mother was entrusted with the responsibility of raising four boys and a girl she was carrying at the time.
Dr. Smith’s brothers — Stephen, Class of 1972; Brian, Class of 1976; and Kevin, Class of 1979 — also graduated from Gibbons.
Dr. Smith says: “I think when I was at Gibbons my education with the Marianists was great – not only morally and ethically but in the pursuit of academic excellence. They were not only mentors but great guidance counselors as well, teachers like Brother Matthew Betz and Brother William Abel.
“I think that’s why science came easy to me because I was intrigued by the way the science of the human body interacted with physical science. That’s what initially attracted me to pulmonary medicine.”
Dr. Richardson even admits: “If I hadn’t been lucky enough to get into medicine, I probably would have been a high school biology teacher.”
That’s Gibbons’ loss, the medical community’s gain.