Goodbye to a Gator

Goodbye to a Gator

Czerne M. Reid
David Paulus, M.D.

David Paulus, M.D.

The UF College of Medicine lost a distinguished physician, teacher and mentor in December when anesthesiology professor David Paulus, M.D., passed away unexpectedly. He was 67. “Dave was a physician’s physician — he was my physician. Many of us asked him to take care of us individually when we needed to receive anesthesia,” said Dean Michael L. Good, M.D. “His heart was full of compassion and he lived fully in service of others. We cannot begin to name or number all the lives that he has touched.” A professor in the department of anesthesiology and in the College of Engineering’s department of mechanical engineering, Paulus is remembered as someone who had a passion for making sure that patients had exceptional, safe experiences, and who had an unshakeable commitment to his colleagues. That dual commitment was on display when he guided the anesthesiology department to adopt as part of its mission statement the idea that the physicians take great care not just of their patients, but of each other.

“We wouldn’t have had that in there if it hadn’t been for Dave,” said anesthesiology chair Kayser Enneking, M.D. “I’ve really come to believe in it.”