IN MEMORIAM

WHEN I FIRST CAME TO SACRAMENTO in 1971 and joined the medical community, George Gross, MD, was one of the younger of the pioneering psychiatrists. He first joined the medical staff of Sutter Memorial in 1955 and was chief of the psychiatric department 1972-72.

He was a key member of the Sutter Community Health Center. He had both clinical and administrative duties and was always willing to take on new challenges including adolescent psychiatry, electroconvulsive therapy, and partial hospitalization, and was very knowledgeable about new psychiatric medications.

He served as a mentor to me and several other psychiatrists who soon followed. He was well respected and liked by his colleagues, both psychiatric and non-psychiatric physicians, staff, patients and their families. He was always will-ing to take on difficult problems and handled them skillfully.

His interest in organized psychiatry included the Central California Psychiatric Society, a district branch of the American Psychiatric Association. He was the first president of this organization and designed its logo. The APA recog-nized all these contributions by awarding him the prestigious title of Distinguished Life Fellow.

He had special interests in medical ethics and was responsible for updating ethical standards in the APA. He also was a pioneer in psychiatric peer review and his work locally set up guidelines that were established nationally. Many of his patients were impaired physicians and this was another area of his leadership and innovation.

His mentoring with me resulted in my becoming a president of the CCPS and to make medical and psychiatric peer review a significant part of my clinical practice.

George and Vivian "retired" to Florida several years ago, but he continued to practice in the local prison system (another area he was an early pioneer in) until recently. He died in his Florida home on September 24, 2007. I will miss George for his professionalism, leadership and friendship as will many of his colleagues, friends and former patients in Sacramento. I still picture his distinguished face blowing flames from a trumpet on a 1983 Jazz Festival Poster.

- James A. Margolis, MD