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City People

Part of the family

Practicing family medicine the old-fashioned way, Dr. Albert Tawil has earned the admiration of peers and patients.

By SHERRI DAY
Published July 22, 2005

PARKLAND ESTATES - In April, an electrical fire tore through his decades-old practice, devouring nearly everything. It might have nudged another man into retirement. But not Dr. Albert Tawil.

Within a week, Tawil's office was back up and running, operating from a new building behind Memorial Hospital.

"We realized everything was destroyed except the records room," said Tawil, 68.

In the interim, patients called his wife's cell phone to make appointments. Tawil saw them at an office next door to his charred building.

That kind of dedication has long earned Tawil the admiration of patients and colleagues. Last weekend, the Florida Academy of Family Physicians named Tawil its 2005 Family Physician of the Year. Tawil is the first Tampa doctor to receive the honor in at least 25 years, the group said.

The organization's vice president, Tad P. Fisher, said Tawil was well worthy.

"In the first 20 years, he never took a vacation," Fisher said. "This is the kind of guy, if you called him in the middle of the night, he would be there for you. Those are the types of doctors in the field that we're always looking for, the unsung heroes."

Born to a Syrian father and a Greek mother in Scranton, Pa., Tawil had little choice but medicine. His merchant father insisted that all smart men became doctors, a career insulated from the ebb and flow of the economy. Both Tawil and his brother Robert, a Tampa dermatologist who is 18 years younger, obliged.

Tawil completed the University of Scranton in three years and began applying to medical schools. A dean at the University of Pennsylvania's medical school suggested that he was not Ivy League material. From other schools there came deafening silence, which nearly stifled his dream.

One afternoon, Tawil's mother handed him a thin letter from Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia. Inside were the words he'd been waiting to read. Soon other letters came, offering interviews at Cornell and Temple universities.

But Tawil was set on Jefferson and spent the next four years in intense study. The summer before medical school, he began courting the woman who would become his wife, Judy, whom he had met while working as a playground supervisor in Scranton.

After graduating in 1962, Tawil moved to St. Petersburg with his young family. He worked as a resident at Mound Park Hospital, now Bayfront Medical Center. Upon completing his residency, he came to Tampa to be closer to his parents, who had moved to Florida. Tawil opened his practice on Buffalo Avenue, now Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, near St. Joseph's Hospital.

Seasoned doctors steered Tawil into family medicine. Overwhelmed, many of them sent patients his way. Since then, business has rarely slowed.

During his 42-year career, Tawil has treated generations of Tampa residents. They invite him to their weddings, funerals and other family celebrations.

His patients, staffers and fellow doctors liken him to Marcus Welby or a doctor from a Norman Rockwell painting come to life. Nearly every day, Tawil operates in the ways of the old bag-toting doctors. He makes his own rounds at hospitals, sees patients at his office and, when necessary, makes house calls.

A clinical assistant professor of medicine at the University of South Florida College of Medicine, Tawil has also trained scores of doctors and nurses. He tries to pass along old-school medical training to a generation of doctors reliant on technology to diagnose patients.

"They walk around with these little pocket computers and, to me, that doesn't substitute for what they ought to have in their head," he said. "They look up the differential diagnosis every time; they ought to know that. They shouldn't rely on a CAT scan to diagnose every abdominal pain that comes by them. Appendicitis is still best judged by a clinical evaluation. A peptic ulcer can be judged almost by history. Someone lost 15 pounds, and you can't find out why. You don't need a computer to tell you that; you can take a good history."

Tawil has earned certification by the American Board of Family Physicians six times. He is also board certified in geriatrics.

Ada Begelman has seen Tawil for more than 20 years. She appreciates his thoroughness.

Once, when he took a trip to New York, he phoned her to make sure she was reacting properly to medication. Moments before she underwent gall bladder surgery, she took comfort in seeing Tawil standing near her surgeon.

"He said, "You don't think I'm going to let you go through this alone,' " Begelman said. "When you go to a doctor like this, you really don't want to go to anybody else."

- Sherri Day can be reached at 226-3405 or sday@sptimes.com

CLAIM TO FAME: 2005 Family Physician of the Year, Florida Academy of Family Physicians

AGE: 68

LIVES IN: Beach Park with wife, Judy

STAYING FIT: Swims every morning

SUBSCRIBES TO: 25 monthly medical journals and attempts to read every one

AND ON DRUMS: Was drummer for the Melody Makers, a college band; still plays at family gatherings and events.

ON RETIREMENT: Isn't entertaining the thought. Being a doctor is "all I know how to do."

[Last modified July 21, 2005, 08:56:10]