Physician to two presidents avoids politics, prefers adventure - Profile - Gerry Cox, includes related article

Physician Executive, July-August, 2002 by Michelle R. Davis

THE DAY THE U.S. Senate began President Clinton's impeachment trial in January 1999, Gerry Cox, MD, MHA, was sitting in an ornate conference room interviewing for a job as one of the president's physicians.

It was the height of the furor over the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Cigars, that infamous blue dress and the Senate proceedings were uppermost in the minds of many Americans. But Cox, a U.S. Navy captain who specializes in emergency medicine, was caught off guard when the question came from the interviewers.

Would you vote to convict the president?

Cox wanted to avoid that minefield. He stalled for time. He said he didn't have all the facts. He needed to hear from witnesses.

But the interviewers pressed for an answer.

Finally, Cox said yes, he would vote to remove from office the man he hoped to work for.

"I said it didn't matter though, because all my patients deserve equal treatment and respect regardless of their political affiliation, regardless of my political affiliation," Cox recalls. "I don't ask any of my other patients who they voted for."

The same day, Cox got the job.

Front-row seat to history

More than three years later, the youthful Cox, 43, sits in his small, tidy office at the National Naval Medical Center outside of Washington, D.C., where he is chief of emergency medicine.

His office bears the mementos of his time at the White House, which straddled both the Clinton and Bush presidencies. In one photo, a tuxedo-clad Cox is flanked by George W. and Laura Bush. In another, Vice President Al Gore is swearing him in for a promotion. In a third, Cox and his wife celebrate the holidays with Bill and Hillary Clinton at a White House Christmas party.

The two-year White House stint was just a small slice of a lengthy and varied career for Cox.

Nineteen years of active military duty in positions that took Cox from Saudi Arabia to Japan gave him the background the U.S. Navy was looking for to solve problems in the Naval Hospital's emergency room. His training as a flight surgeon, his skills managing the health of an entire ship's crew and his ability to work under the intense pressure of war made him the man for the job.

"He's credible and he's also got the personality to build the bridges that need to be built," says Capt. John Sentell, deputy chief of the Navy Medical Corps, who is responsible for the "care and feeding" of officers' careers. Cox has "the combination of personality and poise that was needed," Sentell says.

Some of that poise was developed at the White House, where Cox had to stick the most powerful men in America with needles.

The White House job was actually a lateral move for Cox. Though prestigious, it didn't advance his Navy career the way another position might have. "It's a sidestep because it's not in the mainstream of Navy medicine," Sentell says.

For Cox, the lure of witnessing momentous events as they happened was too much to resist. "I feel like I had a front row seat to history during that time," Cox says.

In June 1999, Cox became one of six physicians in the president's medicine cabinet. They represented the U.S. Army, Navy and Air Force, explains Barbara Idone administrator for the White House medical unit.

The medical staff works out of a three-treatment room clinic in the Old Executive Office Building on the 18-acre White House campus, she says. Physicians are on call 24 hours a day and often travel with the president and vice president.

Though their main responsibility is to ensure the health of those leaders, the medical personnel are also available for urgent care treatment of the thousands of other staffers in the complex, including Secret Service members.

Wash your hands, Mr.President

Cox traveled to Camp David with both Clinton and Bush and worked out at the gym alongside Bush.

As one of the White House physicians, Cox treated both presidents for routine health issues, like colds and sore throats, though he said most details are confidential.

Cox did have to give special thought to the job of president, making sure the leaders used proper hand-washing techniques after marathon handshaking appearances and sunscreen for outdoor events.

The staff wasn't the only ones Cox and his colleagues had to worry about. Cox kept a close eye on White House pets like Clinton cat, Socks and the now deceased Labrador, Buddy, along with Bush's canines Spot and Barney. At times, the White House doctors serve as liaisons to veterinarians, he says.

Cox started in the job by traveling with Vice President Al Gore ("You practice protecting the vice president before they let you near the big guy.") in January 2000. The Tennessee Democrat was in the throes of a national campaign for president that ultimately became one of the most controversial and peculiar presidential races in history.

For Cox, it was fascinating to watch a campaign event unfold: listening in as Gore staffers tried to spin the press and then picking up the newspaper the next morning to see how it all played out. When Cox moved on to spend more tune with Clinton, he was on the advance medical team that prepared for Clinton's G-8 summit in Okinawa and the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting in Brunei. He also attended the United Nations Summit in New York City.