THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, April 12, 1995 TAG: 9504120420
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Guy Friddell
LENGTH: Medium: 77 lines
For Dr. L.D. Britt, who will be honored tonight by B'nai B'rith, life is a four-letter word: W-O-R-K.
It's a wonder the busy surgeon can get to the banquet at Omni Waterside Hotel to receive the Great American Traditions Award.
His parents reared him to see obstacles as stepping stones. His mother taught school in Suffolk. His father was a shipyard foreman.
In Suffolk's Booker T. Washington High, young Britt decided to become a doctor after injuring his knee at football. He graduated at 16 as valedictorian.
``Ours was the next-to-last segregated class,'' he said Tuesday.
``Our teachers accented excellence. If you didn't do right, the teacher pulled you aside without fear of being sued.''
At the University of Virginia, he and other African Americans kept one thing in focus amid campus protests: academic excellence.
``We knew if we were going to make an impact, we had to be outstanding,'' he said. ``Our social life was built around study. It was not uncommon to study six to eight hours.''
Four years in Charlottesville added ``an extra dimension for us in discipline and work ethic.''
Britt's idea of making an impact was to go away, train thoroughly, and return to work among peers.
He graduated from the Harvard Medical School and the Harvard School of Public Health and did his internship and research fellowship at Washington University in St. Louis. Then he undertook his ``pilgrimage'' of training at Cook County Hospital in Chicago.
``After I left Cook County,'' he said, ``nothing could cross the threshold of an operating room that I was not comfortable with.
``Every time I talk about Cook County, I smile. There's something to be said for working under fire.''
It was time to come home, he decided. Here he is chairman of general surgery and chief of the division of trauma and critical care of Eastern Virginia Medical School. In 1994 he won Virginia's Outstanding Faculty Award.
Britt is medical director of the shock trauma center at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital.
``He could have gone anywhere, but he chose to come home and he has stuck with it despite other offers,'' said Dr. Mason Andrews of EVMS. ``He gives heavily of time and money to the region. As Norfolk State University's vice rector, he strives for quality education.''
Britt also is on the University of Virginia's board of managers.
Britt, 43, arises at 4 a.m. for an hour and a half workout. ``That's where I get my energy,'' he said.
For comfort, he operates in his socks. Nurses place blankets by operating tables to cushion his feet. His day ends late at night.
Once a week he is in Suffolk. Among patients are his mother's friends and his former teachers. ``I knew I couldn't come back and not do something directly in Suffolk.''
One day he'll run for office.
``Everybody,'' he said, ``should have two professions.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo
Dr. L.D. Britt
by CNB