Dr. Kathryn A Knudson Grice, MD

About Me

I was born in Flint, Michigan, and graduated from the University of Michigan with a degree in history and applied to medical school when it was not the usual thing for a female. I decided to study medicine when I was in high school because it was totally different from anything I had known or seen in my family. For years I had to correct people, telling them I wanted to become a physician, not a nurse. I have practiced at Kaiser Permanente since 1977. I served as chief of the Department of Pathology and clinical laboratory director at Kaiser Permanente in Martinez, and then I transferred to the Pathology Department at Kaiser Permanente Walnut Creek in 1997.

I am married to an attorney and we have two daughters. One is a law student and the other an accounting major in college. I enjoy cooking, interior design, flower arranging, embossing, and traveling.

Why did I specialize in pathology?

If studying medicine is the study of human disease, then the pathology department is …where the diagnosing and classification of disease takes place. From the macroscopic to the vividly colored pink and purple dyes on glass slides for microscopic analysis of tissue, our department deals in diagnosing illness as well as wellness. I like to refer to the pathology laboratory as "Cell City" since even a few small cells are important to us. Many diagnoses are routine, but challenging cases come across my desk every day. That’s when the detective work of pathology, the searching for clues with high-tech stains and procedures, comes into play. It is like solving a mystery, trying to fit together clinical and surgical impressions, and imaging and laboratory findings with microscopic interpretations, to give the patient the most accurate diagnosis possible. It is a fascinating endeavor, not always explained in textbooks, occasionally uncertain, but always extraordinary.