For the doctors at Infectious Disease Consultants in Wichita, creating a fund to support the KU School of Medicine-Wichita Internal Medicine Residency Program was an easy decision, especially one bearing the name of their founder, Hewitt Goodpasture, M.D.

"Hew is the seminal influence on infectious disease in Wichita. He's trained everybody in town, myself included, from residents to medical students to nurses and allied health personnel through his antibiotic stewardship and infection prevention," said Thomas Moore, M.D., a partner in the practice. "He's just a giant in infectious disease, not just locally, but nationally."

The Infectious Disease Consultants - The Hewitt Goodpasture, M.D., Fund is a $25,000 unrestricted fund to support the education of internal medicine residents in the program sponsored by KU School of Medicine-Wichita.

"We felt it was very important to honor his legacy," said Moore. He and his five partners all have multiple KU ties, including medical school, residency or fellowship. All now serve as volunteer faculty at KU School of Medicine-Wichita, as did Goodpasture.

Thomas Moore, M.D., a partner at Infectious Disease Consultants in Wichita and a KU School of Medicine-Wichita faculty member

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, with infectious disease specialists "hit hard with consults and patient volumes," the residency program was able to help support Moore's group, said William J. Salyers, M.D., residency director and chair of internal medicine at the medical school. He said the program and the practice have also discussed ways to continue to ensure HIV patients receive the care they long have had from KU School of Medicine-Wichita faculty member Donna Sweet, M.D.

"Their practice is a very important resource for our resident education," said Salyers, who recalls doing rotations with Moore during residency. "It's a really good partnership, with their clinical practice and their love of teaching and support of the university and the residency program."

Moore recalls enriching activities and support during residency and fellowship, such as visiting speakers or financial help for travel to present at conferences. "The thing to remember about residency is that your full-time job is to educate yourself. You're supposed to be learning and reading, to become the best doctor you can be," Moore said.

The Goodpasture fund could help pay for preparatory materials for boards or the cost of resident examinations, Salyers said. The program has 42 residents, with a half-dozen of those in a preliminary residency year. It also shares responsibility for 12 medicine-pediatrics residents.

"These funds really help us provide a comprehensive educational experience for residents," Salyers said. "It also helps from a recruitment standpoint, with residents knowing that if they come here, they'll have all the resources they need to get the best education possible."

A KU School of Medicine-Kansas City graduate, Goodpasture worked for the Centers for Disease Control for two years and returned to his hometown of Wichita in 1975 and joined the KU School of Medicine-Wichita faculty. Several years later, he went into private practice and would take on multiple leadership roles in the medical community in ensuing years, including as medical chief of staff at both Via Christi Hospital and Wesley Medical Center. Retiring from clinical practice in 2013 and fully retiring in 2018, Goodpasture and his wife, Judy, continue to live in Wichita.

Among Goodpasture's work was helping develop a treatment - outpatient parenteral antibiotic therapy - that improved both the standard of care and the lives of patients, Moore said. After OPAT was developed in the 1970s, patients could receive intravenous treatment at home or in an outpatient clinic instead of having to be hospitalized.

The Goodpasture name is one with deep roots in the Wichita medical community. Hewitt Goodpasture's father, Carter, was an internist who began practice in Wichita in 1948. As KU School of Medicine-Wichita came together in the early 1970s, Carter Goodpasture became a professor and established the internal medicine residency. In addition to doctors, what every residency program needs is patients - and Goodpasture provided them, Moore said.

"In order to have an internal medicine residency, Carter Goodpasture just announced one day he would give his practice to the school. People don't just do that," Moore said.

"All of us currently in practice are direct or indirect beneficiaries of the selfless act of the Goodpastures taking their time, talent and treasure and putting it to the betterment of society in the medical sense," Moore said.

Supporting the mission

Those interested in making gifts or pledges to support KU School of Medicine-Wichita or specific programs or departments can contact Brad Rukes, KU Endowment development director for KU School of Medicine-Wichita & Salina, at 316-293-2641 or brukes@kuendowment.org.