Dr. Joseph Anthony Panicali, MD

Dr. Panicali went above and beyond the call of duty to skilfully save my beloved then 94-year old mother's life after a collapsed lung, heart attack and three strokes. His humor and charm engaged her, his medical advice to very risky options was spot on and gave my family four more invaluable years of closure with a brilliant woman who is several history books. Thanks to Dr. Panicali and Kaiser, she recovered 90% of her brain capacity for most of those years and was able to hike up with her walker (even faster than before) to the MLK Jr. mural under the fountain at Yerba Buena Gardens to read her favourite quotes. Dr. Panicali took the time to walk me through my mom's DNR order and when he heard me tearfully noting "each time I have to do this I cry," he pulled me aside, sat me down to go through her chart and pulled out all the old DNRs that were contradictory and tossed them. "You should never have to go through this difficult taks again," he said kindly. Dr. Panicali took the… time to care for not only his patient, but their family, going above and beyond. He was there for most of the new strokes my mom had in the Kaiser hospital upon subsequent visits. He is the kind of doctor about whom movies are made.