by Richard Schaefer on 2014-04-02
In 1950, David B. Hinshaw Sr., MD, entered a four-year surgery residency at the University of Oregon and its affiliated Veterans Administration Hospital. Then in 1954, instead of going into private practice, and because he thought he would enjoy academia, he wrote to John E. Peterson, MD, whom he remembered from medical school days, and asked if he might be needed in Loma Linda at the College of Medical Evangelists. Looking back on this time, Dr. Hinshaw reminisced: “I’ve always felt in my life that I should be available to this institution if it needed me. Instead of going into private practice, I felt I should offer my services, such as they were, to the institution. If I were needed, it would be my duty to come and do whatever I needed to do or at least look at it—that I wasn’t really free until I had discharged that as an obligation in a sense. I’m very much bound up with this institution in my life and can hardly separate myself from it, in good times or bad.”
Hinshaw’s inquiry coincided with CME’s recently added responsibilities at the 3,000-bed Los Angeles County General Hospital, which had huge intern and resident programs. As a result, Hinshaw joined CME’s full-time clinical faculty assigned to the County Hospital. He became an instructor in the Department of Surgery for $8,000 a year and received no benefits. He immediately became heavily involved with student physicians, interns, and residents. He described himself and most of his colleagues as “a cadre of youngsters.” By the end of the decade Hinshaw had participated in a number of research projects and became coordinator of the Department of Surgery, an executive without an official title at “the County.”
By this time, considerable pressure was being applied by the American Medical Association’s Council on Medical Education for two-campus schools of medicine in America to coordinate basic sciences with clinical experience on one campus. The Council had promoted this position, which had been put temporarily on hold by World War II, since the 1930s and 1940s. These influences forced medical schools to develop a more effective working relationship, a cross-fertilization between basic science and clinical science departments that would result in more effective teaching.
Accreditation concerns forced the Seventh-day Adventist denomination to decide what to do with CME. The consensus was that nobody in his right mind would think that there was any way to recreate in Loma Linda the huge clinical material mass and machinery, which had taken generations to build in Los Angeles. Pressure to consolidate in Los Angeles became “high drama.” The clinical faculty thought the move was obvious and would happen in just a matter of time. They were all sincere, and logic was on their side. In their opinion a move to Loma Linda would dissolve the School. An inadequate number of patients would jeopardize its accreditation. On the other hand, the basic science faculty was bitterly opposed to moving to Los Angeles and were viewed as stubborn.
A blue ribbon team of powerful and prestigious school of medicine deans, some of them members of the Council on Medical Education, spent a week interviewing people on both sides of the controversy. Because of the preponderance of institutional strength in Los Angeles, they recommended that CME consolidate in Los Angeles.
In 1960, as an assistant professor of surgery, Hinshaw became quite ill with hepatitis. Because he was unable to work for two or three months, he decided to give further study to the writings of Loma Linda’s co-founder, Ellen G. White. “I read everything there was about it. What is essentially my view is that the school was established obviously on this [Loma Linda] locality. There is nothing to suggest that from the point of view of the church at the founding of the school that it was intended to be anywhere else. Mrs. White, or course, made a statement that this would become [an important] educational center. …how was the church going to walk away from here in view of that. This was a crisis involving Mrs. White’s writings at the time.”
Then, with the support of the young faculty of the Department of Surgery and a decision by the older departmental leaders, David B. Hinshaw, Sr., MD, became chair of the Department of Surgery in July 1961, the same month the College of Medical Evangelists became Loma Linda University. The appointment thrust him into the middle of the consolidation controversy. The Department of Surgery had grown in stature, had important research grants, published its research, and presented papers in various places.
In the spring of 1962, Godfrey T. Anderson, PhD, president of Loma Linda University, and Maynard V. Campbell, chair of the Board of Trustees, asked Hinshaw if he would become the new dean. “Things are at a real crisis. We’ve got to have some leadership here and we think you can do it.”
Hinshaw was 38 at the time and said, “Sure, I’ll do it, but I don’t know that I want to do it for very long and I’m not willing to give up the chairmanship of the Department of Surgery.” He became dean on July 1, 1962 and retained his leadership of the Department of Surgery.
During the next few months Hinshaw interviewed the Loma Linda basic science faculty. He already knew how the Los Angeles faculty felt. Feelings were strong on both sides. Then out of frustration he approached President Anderson with his perspective. “There has to be a clear-cut decision made or the school is finished. It will never survive a visit [by the accreditation survey team slated for January 1963]. What we have to have is a firm decision and go for it whatever it’s going to be. I’ll support a firm decision, but I won’t support this wobbling around business. That’s surefire death for an institution.”