In the early days of Cricket Health, I was incredibly fortunate to meet Richard Gibney MD at a nephrology conference, and to learn about the truly groundbreaking work he was doing at his nephrology practice and dialysis clinics down in Waco, TX. Over the next few years, Dr Gibney profoundly influenced our core approach to patient care—of empowering patients to take ownership of their health. He offered encouragement and advice, and even became an early investor in our little company. Dr Gibney told me once that he viewed practicing medicine not as a job, it was a sacred calling. And for over forty years, the residents of Waco Texas living with kidney disease were fortunate to be under his care. Please join me in offering my deepest condolences to his loved ones. Please donate to one of the many worthwhile causes he supported. But if you work in healthcare, an even greater tribute would be to go to https://lnkd.in/gMJW4W6F and shamelessly borrow/steal from his ideas; I’m sure Dr Gibney would be delighted!
I share this loss with my friends because I had developed a close relationship with Richard Gibney, MD, and I wanted to share my feelings about him. I met Richard in 2017 with another friend, Joseph Lee, MD JD MBA. I had been discussing with Joseph that our approach to dialysis patients had stayed the same for 50 years and that we needed to do something different. He said he had met a nephrologist from Texas who was doing self-care dialysis in all dialysis centers at the time. I believe he was doing self-care dialysis in 9 FMC dialysis centers, and he was approaching having about 70% of his patients do their dialysis.He suggested that Richard attend the Institute for Health Care Improvement., in 2007, he attended his first meeting in Orlando. During that meeting, he was sitting in the lobby going over the materials, and someone sat beside him and asked him if he could help. It turned out that this someone was Don Berwick, MD, the founder of IHI. Dr Berwick befriended Richard and taught him the principles of quality improvement. While attending the IHI meeting in 2011, he heard a presentation by a group from JonkopIng, Sweden. In Jonkoping, the head nurse of the units, along with some interested patients, began a self-care dialysis unit program. They reached the point that all of the patients in the unit were in self-care. Patients were given the key to the unit, and if they needed dialysis early, they could come in and dialyze themself in the unit. Richard invited this group to come to Waco and show him and his nursing team how to develop a self-care unit. They came for a week and explained how to approach patients to empower them to care for themself. He was first told to move the machine so that the patient could see it and to allow the patient to touch it. Richard approached the staff looking for a unit to start this program, and after working with the staff and teaching them quality improvement, all of the units wanted to start at the same time. This approach resulted in a remarkable program. The outcome of the patient's improved mortality was reduced to half, as was hospitalization. When I heard this, I had to go with Jeff Lehman to see this unit. While seeing their procedures, I met Arvin Raja, who had just founded Cricket Health. He was observing the self-care unit. After that first meeting, Richard and I became fast friends. Over the next few years, I attended the IHI with Richard, who introduced me to the senior leadership of the IHI. These IHI meetings were something special. They were inspirational. They were the only medical meetings I had ever attended, and I went away Inspired. He was a dear friend and a loving, outstanding individual, and he will be missed by many of us in the senior nephrology community. In my mind, I can see him now smiling, working on some other project, and sorting out how to improve its quality. Here is his obituary: https://lnkd.in/gvXQt4ka.
He was a very neat man who truly believed in helping people live their best lives. Patients AND clinicians. He will be missed.
Dianna Budgeon
1mo
Boy healthcare lost one of the greats. Dr. Gibney embodied what it means to empower patients and care givers alike. He was a truly exceptional human and I am so grateful I had the opportunity to visit and spend time with him. He forever changed the way I define person centered care.
Melissa McCool
1mo
What a beautiful testament to a live well lived, Arvind Rajan
Director of Dialysis at Samaritan Health Services
1moThis news is very unexpected and sad. He was an amazing man.