Keith Landrum… Man of integrity.
Back in the day people used to say that a man should plant a tree, build a house and raise a son. We’ve spent probably two hours talking about so many different subjects from medicine, hobbies, lifestyle, law
Everybody has the drive, something to make them strive to do more and better. What is that force for Keith?
Keith has this passion for setting things right. Desire for healing. He firmly believes that the medicine should be about healing and not just making money. When on a few different occasions witnessed that patients were wronged, he knew it was time to check his Pros and Cons and determine what his purpose was with his career in medicine. Outcome was quite unexpected, interesting and very fruitful. In the midst of his successful practice as a podiatrist surgeon he turned the switch and started from the fresh to become no less successful trial lawyer, who seeks the truth and remedies for his wronged by malpractice patients
Tatiana Davidov:
Who is Keith Landrum. What do we need to know about him.
Keith Landrum: I was born on September 3rd 1955 in a city called East Chicago Indiana. My parents and grandparents originally from Alabama migrated to Chicago Midwest for the steel mill jobs. And somewhere along the line parents were divorced and I ended up going to four different high schools in different places and finally graduated from Lompoc High School in California where everybody knows is the Lompoc Federal Prison. I’ve lived about a mile from there.
At some point in high school I just knew I wanted to make a difference in other people’s lives. That when I realized that I want to become a doctor.
I had good grades and it helped to qualify for the University of California at Santa Barbara which I entered in 1973 and majored in biological sciences, four years later I’ve completed my pre-med finished.
I recall, in 1976 There was a career day in 1976 for all of the different doctors appeared on the campus. There was a group of people from San Francisco representing the California College of pediatric Medicine. We had pretty amazing conversation, and they revealed that the amount of black doctors-podiatrists was very low, so they encouraged me to pursue that career. When I looked into it I loved it. So I ended up going to Chicago. I came back to Chicago to the Illinois College of pediatric medicine. They were only five schools in the County: Chicago, San Francisco, Philadelphia, New York, and Cleveland. So I chose Chicago where I spent my next four years getting a doctorate in pediatric Medicine, which I graduated with flying colors in 1981. I then was selected as a surgical resident by the Memorial Hospital of Hawthorne, and that’s what brought me back to California. And I did my surgical residency where I was awarded a plaque of excellence. I finished there in 1982 and started private practice in Hawthorne, California, specializing in pediatric medicine and a foot surgery. I truly loved it all.
TD: What made you change direction from school o medicine to the position to uphold the Law?
KL: It was a “Managed Care.” After about eight years of my successful practice “Managed care” started to infiltrate the South Bay. “Managed care” made people to get permission to see me, as opposed to looking into finding best doctor for their problem. And so my practice started to go down because people were being told where to go as opposed to be having choices. I didn’t like that concept, so I either had to choose to go work for the managed care people or choose another profession. It wasn’t an easy decision, but it was something I felt right about. I felt there should be specialist, who know medicine inside and out and they would be able to use this knowledge to protect patients, who were stripped of their rights.
So I decided to go to law school and I enrolled in 1988 and
TD: What was the last straw to push you over the edge?
KL: It was all becoming so very clear which direction the medicine was being pushed to. It was now more about making money instead of finding the right choice to heal the patient, it became more about business and economics of medicine as opposed to what’s in the best interests of the patients.
The system system wasn’t really geared toward what’s in the best interests of the patient. How do we save money and help people as opposed to what’s best let’s do what’s best and worry about the cost later. I wasn’t into the you know the cutting corners to try to help people. I was into what’s best for them. You know this is the United States of America. People deserve the best medical care.
TD: What was the breaking point for you to make the change?
KL: There were a few situations which really I’d say broke the camel’s back and made me change my directions. I had a nine year old patient. She had what’s called a mosaic verruca which is a really bad and painful wart. I was certified in laser surgery and I wanted to use the laser which would to remove it and wouldn’t leave no scar and not cause any pain. Managed Care people didn’t let me it. Instead they wanted me to use what they said a plaque chemical and burn it off. I was pleading to them, trying to explain to them that chemical burn can’t be properly controlled.If the amount of substance is improper than you can’t reverse it. Instead of healing the patient can be actually badly burned, and I refused to perform this wrong procedure.
The patient went to a different doctor, who followed the instructions from Managed Care, and unfortunately as a result form the treatment the patient did get burned, third degree burn! S She ended up in my hospital where then I ended up having to treat the burn. This was horrible.
Soon after I had another patient who actually complained she had a lesion that I never seen before and. It was on the outside of her left foot. I got a bad feeling about her symptoms, my gut told me it was bad, and I said I wanted to biopsy it. Managed Care said to me “wait three months.” I just knew it would be too late in three months. So I told the patient: “don’t wait?” I said pay out of your pocket. Do whatever you have to do, but don’t wait. So she went to the headquarters and Fountain Valley on there for get this man and complained that I wanted to do something and they would let her do it. So then they called me to a meeting wanting to know why I was telling patients to go outside of the plan to get work there because they were as I said you guys were covering it so you know they said well that’s not the way things work. And I said well so I kind of got a sense that the way that it was working wasn’t going to work for me.
The patient followed my advice, did biopsy, it turned out that she had what’s called squamous cell carcinoma which was a very bad cancer. If she followed the orders and waited, than It would metastasized through her lymph nodes and she would ended up an amputation of her entire leg. She made complaint against the managed care. Well, instead of you know saying ‘’hey, Keith you did a good job” they said, if I ever did that again they would terminate my contract. That was the line for me, where I was propelled to take a long hard look at the situation and decide where I’m headed. So I said to myself, the hell with this, man! I started looking. I sat down. I drove from that interview. I sat down at my desk. I said to myself, now what can I do? And I made a list of jobs the first one was teacher so I could become a wrestler. I got all these you know knowledge I could teach. And then for some reason I wrote down lawyer at the bottom. But I knew nothing about it. So I said to myself again, well I need to research it.
So I looked in the Yellow Pages. I said what’s the nearest law school. It happened to be a school who called Northrop University which was California accredited school.
I jumped in the car and just drove there. Wade Shane was the dean at that time. I sat down and told him what my issues were. Law school was about to start in a week.
To make a long story short I said I made him a promise that if he will admit me right away than I finish in the top 15 percent of my class, which I did! So I went ahead and finished law school and I became admitted to the bar in 1993, and immediately started doing suing doctors and hospitals. Since they think that they don’t want to do what’s right I’ll make sure somebody hold them accountable for it. So my practice since 1993 has been focused on patient rights. Now I’m an advocate for patients
But the best part of my job is to see people getting help because there are some flaws in our system
We managed to talk more about his best and worst cases, about his family, being a Dad to three sons and a daughter, love for cars and outlook on life. Keith was at his best, very polished and accomplished man with great sense of humor. I had few more questions to ask.
TD: Who is your role model. When you were growing up. Who is your role model now?
KL: That is definitely Martin Luther King and Barack Obama. No matter how stressful and frightening, and troublesome, and fearful the situation was, MLK always was the most calmest guy in place. His demeanor made you feel that you shouldn’t be worried. I would always look at him for a peaceful spirit. He made my life much more peaceful simply by watching him in a midst of turmoil and how he would carry himself. There is no depiction of Martin Luther King ever being angry. He was stern and always had empathy to the point, but he never demonstrated anger. He was my hero for that. He was the one who no matter what would always maintain level of calmness.
My present day hero would have to be Barack Obama, and for the same reason. God only knows. what he dealt with. He has similar characteristics as MLK. That motivates me to keep myself aligned with these type of men who inspire to be great and calm in the process, and that’s what I enjoy about them.
TD: What is the life wisdom you would want to pass on your youngest child?
KL: Life wisdom?! I’ve learned a lot from one of my favorite books by Napoleon Hill “Think and Grow Rich” This book has changed my thinking. It’s not just about money. Most importantly it is a concept, and idea how you think will change your life. That’s what this book taught me.
It’s better to be doing work and being criticized than not do any work and be left alone. Camaraderie of being in the trenches of trying. Honor of being in trenches. The Glory is always in the trenches. That’s what I say to my seven-year old. Glory of being in the game! Having courage taking criticism verses of being non-participating bystander.
