Here's a great story about one man who put the care of others before his own personal gain in dramatic fashion. Dr. Michael Brescia, medical director of Calvary Hospital in the Bronx, NY, was one of the inventors of a procedure in the 1960s that gave patients access to artificial kidneys for the first time. Brescia stood to make a fortune off his invention -- if he would wait one year to publish his findings. Instead he (and his partner, the late Dr. James Cimino) gave the technology away because thousands of people around the world would die if they held out for money.
From the Journal News story on LoHud.com:
"I ran home and I told my father, who was a little Italian man," recalled Brescia, 77. "I said to him in Italian, 'Papa, this thing is wonderful and it's going to work and it's going to save people.' My father said, 'I'm so proud of you.' "
"He said, 'Hurry up, help the people.' And I said, 'Well, we've got to hold it back a year.' My father said, 'A year? How many people will die in that year?' And I said, 'About 50,000 worldwide,' " Brescia said. "He said, 'The faces of the children are going to appear in the mirror, one after the other.' "
He said, 'When you go to dinner leave one chair empty for the mother and father that should be there but are not there because you needed extra boats and houses and great wealth.' He said, 'Give it away.' "
In the end, Brescia did. He said he earned $26.10 — and the comfort of knowing that he and Cimino had helped save thousands of lives.
"I don't know of many people who have done that," said Frank Calamari, president and CEO at Calvary, a hospital dedicated to the care of terminally ill cancer patients. "I'm sure it's happened. I'm sure it's happened in medicine. But it certainly goes into an outlier category. It's not typical."
Read the full story HERE.
