Frederick Challoner, MD

Bio

I was born in 1952 in Sidney, Nebraska and subsequently moved with my family 17 times in 22 years, as my father's profession in the oil industry led us from the midwest to Canada, Alaska, Ireland, and England with sundry stops in between. At 16 years of age I chose, with my parents' blessing, to stay in Alaska and finish high school along with my first two years of college at Fairbanks and Anchorage. Transferring to UC Berkeley in my junior year, I graduated in 1975 with a BS degree in biology.

Volunteer work in an emergency room at a hospital in Oakland gave me the clear feeling that I wanted to be involved in the medical field and in September of 1975 I began medical school at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, graduating with honors in 1979. Internship and residency in general internal medicine followed at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center in San Jose, California where I met and trained with several of the physicians that now work with me here in Santa Rosa.

I joined Kaiser Permanente at the end of my residency, working at the Santa Clara and Milpitas facilities from 1983 through 1988 during which time, in addition to a full time general internal medicine practice, I functioned as Chief of Quality Assurance, Chief of Physician Education, and Chief of Utilization Management. In 1988 my family and I moved to Santa Rosa to be part of the new hospital being built and to escape the South Bay and its prohibitive cost of living and congestion.

Since coming to Kaiser Santa Rosa I have received training as a licensed medical acupuncturist, managed a large clinic practice until 1996, and then helped design and implement one of the first hospital-based specialist programs in the North Bay region. I've been working as one of the "hospitalists" at our facility for the past several years and, although I miss my clinic patients, I have clearly found what I enjoy doing in medicine in caring for the acutely ill patient in the hospital setting. I have been board certified in Internal Medicine by the American Board of Internal Medicine since 1983 and am also licensed to practice medical acupuncture.

I currently live with my wife, Linda, and our blended family in Windsor where we enjoy running in Foothill Park, riding our bikes throughout Sonoma County, skiing in the winter, and diving with the Diving Docs whenever we can.

My Medical Specialty

More details about my specialty:

As one of the few full-time hospitalists at Kaiser Permanente Santa Rosa, I enjoy the intensity of the interactions with patients and staff, the fast pace of hospital medicine and the opportunity to make a real difference in critical situations. The sense of team work that is felt on the ward is a major reward in my work.

My specialty interests and affiliations within my field:

End of life issues and palliative care, medical accupuncture, and oncologic diagnosis are a few of my interests.

Great health resources that I refer to:

Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine, WebMD, New England Journal of Medicine, The Hospitalist, OVID search engine.

Interests

Currently reading:
Garrison Keillor "Pontoon"

My favorite book or author:
Richard Ford "The Lay of the Land"

Great movie:
"The Straight Story"

Family & Friends

People in my life:

Linda is both my wife and the Service Leader for Kaiser Santa Rosa. She can also outrun me on any given footrace. Between us we have four grown children and two useless cats.

My children and people I care about:

Adam, Alyson, Ashley and Lindsay are all young adults involved in various activities from assistant golf pro, first year law student at Pepperdine, culinary academy in San Francisco, to hotel management.
They occasionally come home for large meals and to sleep.

Photos of my Family & Friends:

Fred and Linda in Cozumel

Family at the barbeque

Alyson, Tom, Fred at graduation

Travel

An adventure I've had:

While I was still in medical school, my brother Peter and I skied and climbed to the base camp of Zermatt in Switzerland, armed with ski poles and climbing boots. The fully-outfitted party we met at the camp thought we were crazy. Perhaps.

Favorite place in the world:

Paris in the fall with my wife. Walking, talking, sitting in the cafes at night, great art and music, the food, the architecture and romance. There is no place like it on the planet.

One of my recent trips:

I traveled with my father to Guatemala. We spent two nights in jungle cabins at Tikal wandering the ruins with howler monkeys, lemurs and one black panther sighted. The wonderful people spent hours bartering with my dad.

A Photo of One of My Favorite Places:

Pont des Arts bridge at dusk

In the garden at the Rodin Museum

Stairs to metro at Sacre Coeur