14 | OCTOBER 3 • 2019

P

ediatrician George Blum, M.D.,
of Bloomfield Township began
practicing medicine in 1960. It was
a time when he was regularly treating
children with measles, mumps, polio,
meningitis, severe pneumonia, jaundice,
tuberculosis and diphtheria — many
conditions that today are preventable by
vaccination.
He also treated children with enlarged
heads due to hydrocephalus (also known
as water on the brain). Doctors didn’
t
yet have shunts at their disposal for the
condition. Blum said he also made many
house calls.
“I thought house calls were fun,
” he
said. “I would sometimes get paid with
cake.
”
He would typically pack up his five
kids in the family van and take them
along for calls. His son Robert was in
tow; and from kindergarten until age 10,
he would observe his father interacting
with parents and children.
“I remember many of those house
calls,
” said Robert, who trained to be a
pediatrician like his father. “I remember

that at the dinner table Dad would take a
million calls. He just taught us how to be
doctors.
”
George, now 88, not only taught
Robert, a Beverly Hills resident, how to
cultivate good bedside manners, but also
how to put children and their parents at
ease.
He taught us “dumb little jokes that
make kids laugh,
” said Robert, 58, who
began practicing pediatric medicine as
a doctor of osteopathy in 1994, after
graduating from Des Moines University
College of Osteopathic Medicine in Iowa.
And now, fast forward to the present,
and the Blum family has produced a
third pediatrician with Robert’
s daughter
Natalie, 30, joining Southfield Pediatrics
(in Bingham Farms and Novi) at the
beginning of August. The Royal Oak
resident graduated from Michigan State
University’
s College of Osteopathic
Medicine in May 2016. She has three
siblings, Madeleine, a social worker, and
brothers Cameron and Weston, who
both work for Disney.
“I tried hard to like something other

continued on page 16

The
Blum
Legacy

Three generations of
pediatricians share a passion
for treating young patients.

ELIZABETH KATZ CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Jews in the D

TOP: Drs. George, Natalie and Robert Blum
confer in the office.

PHOTOS BY RUDY THOMAS

on the cover