World Bank physician practices alternative medicine with international flavor

Physician Executive, May-June, 2004 by Jeff Miller

It might be an agricultural specialist from Angola, an economist from Ethiopia, a loan officer from Lesotho or a research analyst from Rwanda.

The diversity is just part of the fabric of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, which employ 12,000 people--many of them foreign nationals--in downtown Washington, D.C.

Kennedy is a senior medical officer in the health services department of the two sister United Nations agencies that were created after World War II to promote global economic stability and spur development in poor countries. His clinic, located in the World Bank's basement, provides a range of medical services designed to keep the employees healthy so that they can focus on the rest of the world's problems.

"They take care of people here, no question," Kennedy says. "They make it so that the only thing you need to be concerned with is your job. It's a unique institution."

It's also provided Kennedy with unique experiences. He's traveled with the World Bank's globetrotting president, surveyed medical facilities in far-flung lands and consulted on international development projects. He also learned acupuncture, a skill some of his patients prefer to traditional Western medicine for what ails them.

On a daily basis, Kennedy confronts language and cultural barriers as he guides newcomers through the U.S. health care system. But he relies on his faith that patients respond to physicians who listen to their concerns and treat them with respect, regardless of their background or position they hold within the organizations.

"As doctors, we're good at diagnosing things but we don't necessarily do a good job conveying that information to patients," Kennedy says. "Half the success of any treatment is the patient's ability to believe that the person in front of them is actually concerned about them, not just their disease."

Rude doctor

Kennedy, 52, attributes his attitude toward patient care to an early encounter with a doctor that left him so angry he vowed never to need one again.

One of six children, Kennedy was born in Jamaica but raised in Brooklyn from the age of two. His father ran an elevator for a Manhattan furniture store while his mother taught school.

One day when he was 14, he rolled an ankle playing basketball, requiring a trip to the doctor's office. Once there, however, the doctor never spoke to him or asked any questions, directing all his comments toward Kennedy's mother.

"He never touched me, never put a hand on me," says Kennedy, who remembers getting a prescription for cough syrup but nothing for the swelling. "It turned out I had a third-degree sprain, which is one step from a fracture. Of course, we spent the next eight hours in the emergency room to get someone to actually see me."

Kennedy has never forgotten the doctor's name. But it was his mother's advice years later that stuck with him when he decided to go into medicine. "She would always say make sure you treat all your patients the way you would want me to be treated," Kennedy says. "It's kept me grounded."

Medicine, however, was not Kennedy's first career choice.

Only a fair student. Kennedy went to college for the same reason a lot of young men did in the 1960s--to avoid being sent to Vietnam. With a high draft number, it was a real possibility.

"I had already had two or three friends go to Vietnam, and when they came back I saw that that was not the kind of place for me," Kennedy says.

He enrolled in City College of New York and pursued teaching. But after graduation, the job failed to live up to his expectations. Even though he enjoyed being around kids all day, the work itself was unfulfilling.

On the bus to school one morning, a friend suggested he would make a good dentist. It was the first time Kennedy considered a life in health care.

Making the switch wasn't easy, though. His academic record was so spotty that the dean at Cornell University's medical school actually laughed at him. But he also suggested an alternative: the physician's assistant program at New York's New School for Social Research. It was a short program, the dean said, so if Kennedy didn't like it, he wouldn't have wasted years trying to become a doctor.

Kennedy didn't like the way the advice was delivered, but he took it anyway.

Older doctor

As a physician's assistant, Kennedy worked in a drug addiction program, a pediatric ward and a rehabilitation hospital. Before long, he discovered he liked taking care of patients more than teaching school. He also realized that the medical students on rotations were doing the same things he was, only with better career prospects.

"The doctors were making all the money and I was doing all the work. I said I can do this, so I went back to school," Kennedy says.

After conquering his fear of physics and the pre-med curriculum at Fordham University, Kennedy enrolled at the University of Pittsburgh's medical school. The younger students nicknamed the 29-year-old Kennedy "Poppa." But he didn't mind. In fact, he felt his experience gave him a leg up.