Adjusting to another coast

Luis Pena

Robert C. Amster is a 53-year-old Corona del Mar resident and owner

and medical director of Newport Urgent Care.

Where did you grow up?

I grew up back East in New Jersey. Rockaway, a small town near

Morristown, which is about 30 miles west of New York City. It’s a

very small community. I lived there up until basically 1979. We had

the same home all those years. I was in the same neighborhood all my

life until I moved out to California, although, of course, I went to

school and training and all of that, so I was away from home.

What kind of childhood did you have?

I grew up with friends that I’ve basically maintained all my life.

A very close group of eight or 10 of us. And my father worked in New

York City so I was exposed to Manhattan and that area quite a bit. I

have one older sister who moved to New England, and I attended school

basically through medical school back in the East Coast area, either

New Jersey or New York, and then moved out to California in 1979. I

had a lot of good close friends that I went through grade school with

and high school with, and some of [whom] went to the same college I

went to. I was active in sports and music. We played in bands

together. Interestingly, we are having a 40th year, eighth-grade

reunion this summer back in New Jersey.

How did you end up in Newport-Mesa?

Well, I attended school and training in the East, and once I was

finished with my residency, I moved to Los Angeles and met my wife,

one year before I moved out here. My wife is from Northridge. We

initially lived in the West L.A. area, and then she wanted to move to

Orange County, which we did in the mid 1980s, and we’ve been in

Newport Beach, Corona del Mar ever since. Almost 20 years now. First

in Newport Beach for half of that and then Corona del Mar.

What are your greatest accomplishments in life?

Well, No. 1, my 25-year marriage and two great daughters. That’s

my No. 1. [My wife] helped me shape my career and our life at home,

the fact that my wife raised the kids. We decided early on that she

would not work at a job but rather would be home and available for

the kids. And you know, raising a family and being somewhat

successful and keeping the same marriage, I think, is a big

accomplishment. Two is developing a practice that I am in the midst

of doing now in the Newport Beach area after having been in practice

in other areas and other positions. I’ve worked in administrative

capacities as a medical director for health plans. But I think my

second biggest accomplishment is developing this practice here in

Newport. Another thing that I’ve done that I’m proud of is that I

became a professional pilot along the way at the same time that I was

a physician. I was also a commercial pilot. At one point, I had two

careers -- a physician and an airline pilot. I did that for about

two, three-and-a-half years.

If you could re-do one moment or incident in your life, what would

it be?

Probably the birth of kids, because I sort of took it for granted

and now I feel that I should have been more involved in it at the

time. I was physically there, but it was not as momentous to me as it

should have been. At the time, I was working quite a bit and seeing

patients, so you take that for granted, and that’s something that I

regret. It was obviously very meaningful, and I would like to relive

that now if I could.

What profession other than yours would you like to have tried?

I’d like to have had a career as a business executive in a large

service-oriented business. Along the way, I actually got an MBA

degree that’s part of what I’m doing in medicine now. I was and have

been very fascinated with the business environment, and I think I

have some good leadership and management skills. I like the

decision-making, the interaction with clients. I like the operational

aspects of managing a business. That would have been attractive to me

when I was younger.

What are some differences between a typical day in your life now

versus a day in your life 20 years ago?

Twenty years ago, I was just starting out. I was consumed with

work, unfortunately, and I was very much involved clinically with the

patients that I saw. And now, I do things differently. I’m more in

the business environment at this point. I’m involved in managing

large populations of patients rather than individual patients. I’m

involved in some medical policy-making, and I’m also much more

entrepreneurial. Back then, I was more just a worker -- someone

without a long-term vision, just inundated with the responsibilities

of my career.

What is the greatest lesson you’ve learned in your life?

How to get along with people and not to underestimate other people

and how to respect people and their opinions more. The first part of

my life, I was learning and training so much that I never got the

chance to know people very well. I saw large numbers of people who

were sick and treated them for their clinical problems but really

didn’t get to know them better. But now, as I become more involved in

the business side of things, I realize how multidimensional people

are and how much I’ve learned from others. I can easily say that I’ve

learned just as much from my experiences with other people as I have

in the formal education process. Just incidents in my life where I

made decisions in isolation that if I had listened to others, had

interacted with other people, I probably wouldn’t have made.

What do you treasure most?

My relationship with my kids and my wife. I treasure the

opportunities to relax apart from work. And to develop my

intellectual curiosity about learning new things that I never had

time to do before.

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