Thomas Crane, MD

Bio

I was born and raised in Columbus, Ohio. After attending Antioch College for a few years, I was lured away by work (as a bicycle messenger in San Francisco) and travel (in Latin America). I learned the value of medicine in Guatemala when I met children who were doomed by the absence of even simple public health measures. When I returned to college at Boston University, it was as a pre-med student.

I met the love of my life, a young social worker named Susan Shaw, while attending medical school in Cleveland, Ohio. We were married in 1980, and a year later, we found ourselves in Santa Rosa, California, where I joined the Community Hospital (now Sutter Medical Center) Family Medicine residency training program. I joined Kaiser Permanente's Family Practice Department in 1985.

After 11 years at Kaiser Permanente, I went to work at a Spanish-speaking community clinic in Healdsburg. Since returning to Kaiser Permanente in 2003, I divide my time between seeing our patients in local skilled nursing facilities and running the Palliative Care Service. I am also the medical director of the Kaiser Santa Rosa Home Health department.

My Medical Specialty

More details about my specialty:

Family Medicine has always fascinated me. The breadth of training and the problems addressed by the family doctor guarantee I'll never be bored at work! I've been fortunate to deliver babies, perform surgeries, see kids, teens and adults, and most recently, focus on the geriatric care of Kaiser Permanente's nursing home population.

My specialty interests and affiliations within my field:

Since early 2005, I have directed Kaiser Santa Rosa's Palliative Care Service. We physicians have a lot to learn about care at the end of life. How can we help our patients cope with a life-threatening illness? How do we and our patients find meaning and purpose when we face death? The goal of the palliative care team is to help patients and their families face serious illness and make health care plans that reflect their beliefs, values and goals. We focus closely on alleviating symptoms that interfere with attaining the best possible quality of life.

Photos from My Training Years or of Practicing Medicine in My Field:

Robert Taylor in The Magnificent Obsession, 1935

Interests

Great movie:
Murderball is a fascinating and optimistic documentary about quadriplegic young men who have clawed their way back from extreme disability to compete internationally in wheelchair rugby!

Hobby Photos & Links:

For birdwatchers, check out the web site of the Madrone Audubon Society:

Family & Friends

People in my life:

My wife, Susan Shaw, has been an amazing source of love, support and companionship for nearly half of my life. Susan is a licensed clinical social worker who teaches mediation skills to middle and high school students and is helping to create a labor center to ensure a dignified hiring process for immigrant day laborers in Graton, California. In addition to being the social conscience of our family, Susan has helped raise our two wonderful children and has created a garden paradise all around our home.

My children and people I care about:

Susan and I have two remarkable and lively children. Emma, born in 1985, is a veteran horsewoman and international traveler, and is now a student at UC Berkeley. Adam, born in 1987, is a senior at the Summerfield Waldorf School. He's an accomplished photographer and artist with several exciting and dangerous hobbies!

An interesting story about my family or friends:

While sorting through photos recently, I came across this gem. It's my wonderful father-in-law, El Shaw, as a young WWII marine standing with a buddy in front of a disabled Japanese tank on the island of Saipan. El saw terrible combat with the Second Marines on Tarawa, Saipan and elsewhere, and served with the occupation forces in Nagasaki just two weeks after the 2nd atomic bomb was dropped there. The dedication and sacrifice of soldiers like El never fails to move me.

Photos of my Family & Friends:

My wife Susan

Adam, Susan, me and Emma on a recent trip to Alaska

El Shaw (hatless on right)

We are the proud owners of three dogs, three cats and (currently) two horses. These wonderful resident pets will be with us long after the children who begged for them have left home! Pictured is Sparky, the herding dog who is only really happy corralling horses and chasing tennis balls.

Pet Photos:

Sparky the Wonder Dog

Travel

An adventure I've had:

In 1993, I took a leave of absence from Kaiser Permanente to spend a year with my family in Chiapas, Mexico. We arrived in San Cristobal de las Casas, a beautiful colonial town in the Mayan highlands, in September and enrolled our kids in a local school, while we took Spanish lessons and explored our new home.

Three months later, on January 1st, 1994, our city was taken over by a previously unknown guerrilla group called the Zapatista Army of National Liberation. In defiance of generations of neglect, abuse and economic exploitation, this clandestine force of dispossessed Mayan farmers and laborers rose up to capture the Mexican imagination. After a peaceful occupation of San Cristobal's center, the Zapatistas retreated to the countryside, where the Mexican Army quickly followed them, bombing villages and torturing local leaders to track down the insurgents.

As reports of Army abuse began to mount, I went to work coordinating a team of investigators for Physicians for Human Rights. PHR is an organization dedicated to bringing the skills of the health professions to the defense of human rights. Our PHR team documented grave government violations of human rights and provided forensic evidence for the successful prosecution of the Mexican Army at the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights. The results of our investigations were published in a PHR book, "Waiting for Justice in Chiapas."

For ourselves and our children, the Zapatista rebellion allowed us the chance to see behind the image of quaint and colorful indigenous marketplace vendors to the reality of life for the Mayan natives in Mexico's most beautiful but poorest state. Through the work of PHR, we were admitted into the village life of struggling, courageous farmers, admired the dedication of progressive priests and nuns who serve them, and encountered a whole world of people committed to human dignity and rights.

To learn more about Physicians for Human Rights, go to www.phrusa.org. To find out about the struggle for human rights in Mexico, go to the web site of San Francisco-based Global Exchange at www.globalexchange.org.

Travel Photos:

Exhausted young Zapatista soldiers watch as Mexican Air Force planes circle San Cristobal de las Casas on January 1, 1994