My Keynote Address 2025 KP LAMC FM Residency Graduation

A 3+ Decade Retrospective on Becoming a Family Doc – Part 8

To the Graduates of the Family Medicine Residency program at Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center—congratulations on a job well done.

Three years ago, you came to our medical center and put on a white coat with your name stitched over your heart. Your identity as a family physician was still forming. You may have already known how to take a history, perform a physical exam, or even deliver a baby. But it was here that you learned how to build trust with patients who shared their lives with you. It was here that you learned how to deliver difficult news with kindness—to patients who reminded you of people you love. It was here that you learned how to create a safe space for patients facing transformation. It was also here you began to sharpen your advocacy skills. It was here you learned to uncover wellness within the context of illness.

Today, you are a family physician in every sense—and your presence is your superpower. Over the past three years, you’ve cultivated that presence—an ability to become part of a patient’s life, to hold longitudinal memory, to walk alongside them through the trust you’ve earned. You now understand how to make medical decisions within the full context of your patient’s life. And that’s radical. In a time when medicine is increasingly being driven by algorithms and metrics, you represent a tradition of whole patient care.

Family Medicine follows people.

We seek to understand the full scope of our patients’ lives—their culture, family, limitations, trauma, and resilience.

We don’t just ask, What’s wrong?

We ask, What’s the story?

And then we work to bring healing within that story. That’s why our treatments are followed—because our patients trust us. And that trust helps individuals and families live fuller, healthier lives in their communities.

And think about where you learned this. You trained in one of the most complex and vibrant quaternary care medical centers on the West Coast—located in one of the most dynamic, diverse cities in the country. Los Angeles—especially East Hollywood and Little Armenia—was your learning environment.

This city and this medical center have shown you what’s possible: An academic center with multidisciplinary teams. An integrated healthcare system serving millions. A place with multilingual services and ties to community-based care.

Your education showed you the power of treating health as a relationship, not a transaction. That’s the heart of Kaiser Permanente Family Medicine—preventing and reducing disease through connection and collaboration, not through isolated interventions. A system built around teams, not silos. A system working to reduce barriers to care, making healthcare truly accessible.

And yet—even here—it’s not always easy. You’ve seen the vulnerabilities in our healthcare system—when patients lose coverage and access, lose housing and transportation, or feel unseen and marginalized. You’ve also seen opportunities for improvement such as reducing inefficiencies in care delivery and properly recognizing the time spent with patients who have increasingly complex care needs.

Which is why the Family Medicine physician must also be an advocate. Medicine is political, even if you don’t practice politics. Your engagement in policy, education, mentorship, leadership, and system redesign will be essential throughout your career. You don’t need a title to change a system. You just need to care deeply—and to persist.

Because Family Medicine is about planting seeds. Seeds that grow into generational health. That prevents illness before it begins. That builds community and resilience.

And yes, it does come at a cost.

Medicine will ask more of you than it should. It will ask for your evenings. Your weekends. Sometimes, your spirit.

Burnout is real. But so is the power of boundaries. So is the power of your community and family. So is understanding the principles of wellness. Wellness comes from striving for mastery of your craft, staying grounded in your purpose, and recognizing what you can—and cannot—control. Wellness comes from knowing when to say yes, and when to kindly say, “no.” And then learning to let it go.

Residency Class of 2022–2025. You’ve earned that dash—one of many still to come. But really—what’s in a dash?

This dash separates milestones—but the context is what truly matters in the years ahead. So I ask you: What will you make your next dash stand for as you reach your next milestone for this is not the end? It’s a new beginning. A beautiful beginning.

What will you stand for?

Will you stand for primary care instead of episodic or “fast” medicine?

For wholeness in a system increasingly steering towards transactions?

For patients and populations others have given up on?

For your own boundaries, joy, and sense of calling?

You now have the training—and your journey of learning will continue for life. You’ve always had the heart. Now, you have the tools to express it more fully.

And you are ready.

Not just to practice, but to lead.

Not above, but among.

Not ahead, but alongside.

You are the future of Family Medicine.

Carry its heart forward—with courage and creativity. May the dash in your life be bold, brave, and compassionate.

Let it stand for healing, for justice, for presence—for all the quiet, powerful ways a Family Medicine physician changes lives, one patient, one story, one day at a time.