Being a doctor and dealing with stress go hand in hand, but it’s safe to say that as director of endoscopy at Gastro One, Edward L. Cattau Jr., MD, does not have the health of the president of the United States weighing heavily on his mind, as it did 30 years ago.
At the time, Cattau was a Naval officer and chief of gastroenterology at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. Among other duties, he was consultant to the attending physician to Congress, the vice president and the president.
“In 1984, President Reagan had a routine physical which revealed a positive fecal occult blood test,” Cattau said. “I was consulted and recommended a colonoscopy. My recommendation was not acted upon by those in authority at that time.
“I was told he could not fit it in his schedule while campaigning for his second term. After the election, I continued to write letters to his new physician, stressing the need for the president to have his colonoscopy. After some delay, I performed the procedure in July 1985 and found a cancer in the cecum. The president had a curative operation the following day.”
Cattau later received a Navy commendation medal for his care of the president, but not before he navigated some rough seas, including “professional abuse to which I was subjected by the lay press and their medical consultants.”
“There were a few nationally prominent gastroenterologists who went on television news shows and criticized aspects of the president’s care – particularly the delay between the abnormal stool test result and the colonoscopy – although they were not privy to details which made their comments invalid.
“As an active duty naval officer, I did not have the prerogative of defending myself publically. When Sam Donaldson asked me during a press briefing if I thought the president should have received better care, my response was, ‘The standard of care is the same for you, for me and the president of the United States.’ While the press took this as some type of egalitarian statement, the hidden meaning was the standard of care prompted the recommendation for the president to have a colonoscopy a year earlier, the same as for any patient. In reality, the president’s delay had nothing to do with the standard of care, but rather to a decision by someone to not comply with my recommendation.”
After leaving the Navy in 1986, Cattau joined the faculty at Georgetown University, and four years later decided “my strengths and long-term goals were better suited to private practice.”
He was recruited to Memphis by Lawrence Wruble, MD, founder of Memphis Gastroenterology, and was convinced of “a nearly unique opportunity here.” The office then was downtown, and “we were teaching basic second-year medical school GI physiology classes, not something I’m sure any other private practice group was doing. Plus, Memphis seemed like a good place to raise a family – and it has been.”
The son of a nurse and Navy enlisted man, Cattau was raised in Niagara Falls, New York; Virginia Beach, Virginia; and Worcester, Massachusetts.
“I spent most of my time studying and working,” he said.
He performed in school plays and was class orator, as well as working at a Howard Johnson’s as dishwasher and then night manager. He started at the University of North Carolina on a Navy ROTC scholarship “with the intent of being either a pilot or a JAG officer. It was after my sophomore year that I realized I had a calling for medicine.”
But the next two years he struggled with finances and grades, resigned his ROTC scholarship and had to greatly step up the pace to become a chemistry major and meet the pre-med requirements.
“That was the beginning of a lifetime of sacrifice and support by my dear wife, Sue,” he said. They had dated in high school, and she followed him to UNC. They married at the end of his junior year.
“She quit school and worked clerical jobs to support us,” he said. “She encouraged me to get the grades I needed to get my GPA up.” Sue eventually went on to earn a nursing degree.
They have two grown children – Chris, who is finishing a PhD in wildlife conservation at the University of Florida, and Megan, who just returned from 14 months performing research in Borneo and is on track to earn a PhD in ecology from Columbia University.
Closer to home, Cattau is enthused about the July merger of Memphis Gastroenterology Group and Gastro One. He credits managing partners Drs. Michael Dragutsky and Richard Aycock with steering Gastro One into a leadership role on the state and national level.
Cattau’s free time finds him as an elder at his church, working with the local chapter of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations and doing mission work.
“When I do get to the gym -- not nearly enough, so don’t tell my primary physician – I enjoy listening to faith-based programs.
“My Christian faith is the most important thing that defines me as a person and as a doctor. I don’t talk about it much, quite frankly because on any given day I am such a bad witness as I too often let events inappropriately affect me.
“But I must say I came to Memphis as a self-content, happy moralist thinking I was knowledgeable, humble and open-minded, only to find I was ignorant, arrogant and close-minded. When asked why I came to Memphis, I used to say, ‘It was because of my smooth-talking Jewish senior partner.’ Now I know better and the answer is ‘to receive grace from my merciful, loving Jewish Master. The job was just a sweet perk!’”
