Kim Popejoy
Dr. Kirby was one of the mentors that changed my life. In the early to mid 1970's, I was an OJT in Respiratory Therapy at STH. In the area of mechanical ventilation of humans, it was the "wild, wild, west!" Anesthesiologists needed hands, eyes, ears and brains to help them treat patients and push forward the field of ventilation. Dr. Kirby never seemed to care that I and my fellow therapists did not have the degrees behind our names. He only cared about what we knew, what we observed, what we were capable of learning and doing. His openness to teaching what he knew and learning what we could share about his patients and the abilities of the machines his patients were connected to taught me the essence of scientific research. What I learned from Dr. Kirby I would, a few years later take to the University of Jordan in Amman and seed a new department for that country's teaching hospital. Today, that department flourishes. This success and the people whose lives have been saved as a result can all be traced back to Bob Kirby and his willingness to share his unbounded intellect! Thank you, Dr. Robert R. Kirby.