50th Anniversary Physicians to Receive Honors

              THE SHREVEPORT TIMES SUNDAY, MAY 2, 1971 \50th Anniversary Physicians to Receive Honors
"because I was getting a little old for so
much night work."
College algebra almost kept Gilmer,
descendant of early American settlets,
from becoming a physician, a story he
tells on himself with a chuckle and .a
word of praise for the college official
"who helped me out."
Explaining that he started out in the
Tulane College of Arts and Science, he
switched to premedicine "because I
couldn't pass college algebra." After
passing all of his courses, including
chemistry and physics, and after taking
several tests for algebra, he still couldn't
pass it, "the professor said that I didn't
really need the course to become a
doctor and he gave me a passing grade."
He early became interested in the
treatment of tuberculosis and was named
medical director of the Pines Sanatorium
in 1928.
The field of tuberculosis, he observes,
"has been revolutionalized.
"When I started," he explained,
"treatment was rest in bed, fresh air and
daily encouragement. And, many recov-ered."
Among developments t h r o u g h the
years was a procedure whereby the
diseased lung was collapsed temporarily
and "healed faster."
Gilmer was among the first doctors to
advocate and use varied new methods he
picked up through work with patients or
from attendance at medical meetings
throughout the nation.
"With the advent of drug therapy and
antibiotics, the treatment of tuberculosis
has become more effective and the
c o n v e r s i o n period from positive to
negative sputum has been reduced from
two to three months. Prior to this, it took
months and even years," said the
physician who has spent most of his life
in the field.
At the p r e s e n t time, he added,
"surgical treatment has progressed to
the point that now diseased portions of
the lungs are removed—something un-heard
of at the beginning of my career;
something thought of as impossible."
Calls His Career 'Easy'
Gilmer, at 74, the youngest of the
three physicians, described his medical
career as "easy," explaining that many
of his patients came by appointment,
"and night calls were rare."
He is a charter member of the
American College of Chest Physicians,
and is a Fellow of the American College
of Surgeons and the International College
of Surgeons, and is past president of the
Louisiana Thoracic Society.
He and his wife, the former Julia
Morrow, have one son, Peachy (and the
"Peachy," he said, 'is not a nickname,
but an old family name) R. Gilmer Jr., a
Shreveport pathologist.
It was in 1940 that Galloway, who was
77 Friday, went to the old1 Charity
Hospital, with the intention of getting
additional experience in obstetrics and
gynecology, the medical specialty he was
most interested in.
With only two interruptions since tnen
— a stint at Durval Medical Center,
Jacksonville, Fla., and with the Joint
Commission on Accreditation of Hospi-tals
— he's been at the hospital.
During his first administration at old
Charity, most of the graduate training
programs were set up, and plans were
made for the 755-bed Confederate.
The new hospital was far different
from the original facility, "where I had
seen as many as 640 patients crowded in
a 300-bed, three floor hospital."
The old h o s p i t a l , he said "was
outmoded and more or less obsolete, and
this motivated us to push for a new
building."
No Outpatient Areas
There were no outpatient facilities at
the old building, a service which has
grown to as many as 600 visits a day, he
said.
The graduate training programs—
among the first were medicine, obste-trics-
gynecology, urology and orthopedic
surgery — were started "because there
was a backlog of young doctors who
expressed a desire for specialty train-ing."
Roughneck work in the oil fields of
North Louisiana helped finance Gallo-way's
medical education.
A smile flicked across his face, as he
reminesced, that "one of my babies won
a baby contest at the State Fair one
year," recalling, too, that 'we were close
to patients in those days.' "
Dr. and Mrs. Galloway, the former
Clara Tompkins of Erie, Pa., have four
daughters: Mary Elizabeth Morrison of
Laurel, Miss.; Clara Jean Brown of
Jackson, Miss., and M a r g a r e t Ann
McDowell, and Martha Elaine Galloway,
both of Shfreveport.
Galloway is past president of the
Louisiana Hospital Association, and a
member of the American College of
Hospital Administrators since 1946.
Dr. Potts started out in pharmacy but
decided "I didn't like it and asked my
brother to send me to medical school."
When he started practciing medicine,
"there were only a few drugs—quinine,
coedine, aspirin, morphine and phena-barital,
and paregoric?"
Much of his practice was in his office
and "house calls—there were few people
in the hospital."
And, too, he recalls the practice of
medicine during the depression "when
we had very few patients and made very
little money."
Thousands of new drugs have been
placed on the market in the past 50
years, he pointed out. The greatest
contributions to medicine, he feels are
the discovery of sulphur, penicillin and
tetracyline.
"These have saved many lives," he
said.
Serums too, are important contrbu-tons,
he feels, addng that "typhod fever
and polio have been practically eliminat-ed."
Potts has served as many as four
generations of one family in Shreveport
and attended a wedding one time where
guests included1 "25 who had been
delivered by me."
His hobbies are, "reading, travel and
the practice of medicine."
Potts and his wife, the f o m e r
Welcome Hayhurst of Ottawa, Kan.,
have one daughter, Carol Ann Engman
of Shreveport.
Fifty Years Ago these Shrevport physicians received medical degrees.
They will be recognized at the annual meeting of the Louisiana Med-ical
Society which meets today through Tuesday in Lafayette. They
are (left to right) Dr. Peachy R. Gilmer, director of lung therapy and
inhalation therapy and lung function tests at Fairfield Hospital; Dr.
C. H. Potts, general practitioner, and Dr. Edgar Galloway, director of
Confederate Memorial Medical Center.
By Margaret Martin
Times Medical Writer
It was 50 years ago that Shreveport
physicians Peacny K. Gilmer, Edgar
Galloway and C. H. Potts received their
medical degrees.
They received $3 for house calls and
$2 for office calls and were advised by
older physicians, "don't turn down any
calls. Answer all of them—no matter who
calls or where you have to go."
Although the prices were cheap, many
things were missing—immunizations, in-fection-
fighting drugs and simple cures
for tuberculosis.
The three doctors—all of whom are
still working fulltime—will be honored by
the Louisiana Medical Society tomorrow
at its meeting in Lafayette for 50 years
of service.
Missing from the list of Shreveport
doctors who will be at the meeting in
person to receive recognition from their
colleagues is Dr. Harold Quinn, who
died earlier this year. Dr. Quinn had
also been pratcticing for 50 years.
Dr. Galloway and Dr. Gilmer both
graduated from Tulane Uinversity Medi-cal
School, and Dr. Potts received his
medical education at the University of
Tennessee.
Aside from the MD degrees, there are
few similarities between the three men.
Galloway, who "by accident" became
a hospital administrator in 1941, is
director of Confederate Memorial Medi-cal
Center.
Gilmer, an expert and one of the
early workers on tuberculosis treatment,
is director of inhalation therapy and lung
function studies at Fairfield Hospital.
Potts, 75, is a general practitioner,
who quit delivering babies 10 years ago