1 of 2
KidMed CEO Daniel Custódio
2 of 2
KidMed CEO Daniel Custódio [center] and the team at the KidMed in Short Pump
Daniel Custódio’s path back to Richmond has been long and winding. A one-time Richmonder with a career in poetry, which earned him gold in the 2008 National Poetry Championships, Custódio left in 2011 to pursue higher education and a life in business management. In the next 13 years, he worked in business process management and, after settling back in Richmond in 2017, played a crucial role in bringing acclaim to the Greater Baltimore Medical Center.
All the while, Richmond-based pediatric urgent care chain KidMed was growing separately. Founded by local emergency department physicians Jeff Bennett and Mark Flanzenbaum, KidMed established popular locations in Short Pump, Mechanicsville, Midlothian and Stafford for child-specific care. Celebrating its 15th anniversary this year with big plans in mind, the company brought Custódio on as its first CEO in June.
Richmond magazine: What’s your history with the Richmond region, and what brought you to KidMed?
Daniel Custódio: I was a poet when I was here, and that was a part of my journey into health care and business. Before this job, I worked on a lot of things that were great experiences but didn’t connect me to what I care about ultimately. I have three daughters, 13, 11 and 8, so I really value making change in a place that values my children, too, and I saw that in KidMed. When the opportunity came up to work with them, it was something like a dream.
RM: How would you describe KidMed’s structure and goals?
Custódio: We provide evidence-based, pediatric-specific urgent care to children. If your child is sick and you can’t get access to your primary physician — which is a real issue in health care these days — you don’t want to take them to an emergency room, because that could be a very scary place, especially for a child. The idea with KidMed is that you’re going to be around doctors who are specifically trained in pediatric care and have staff that’s conscious about the experience of a child.
RM: You stepped into this role in June. Is there anything you’re looking forward to as you expand in your role?
Custódio: A lot of my background is in systems thinking, so I’m looking forward to bringing this leadership model and way of solving problems to KidMed as we keep growing. I’ll use a sexy word here: AI. It’s everywhere right now, and some people fear AI, but I embrace it. One of the things we’re planning on doing is automated transcription to ease the burden on providers from taking notes and any distractions from what’s front and center, which is the child who’s in need of you really diagnosing and treating them. So in the next several months, we’re going to be rolling that technology out.
RM: The Association of American Medical Colleges projects a shortage of primary care physicians within the next decade or so. How do you see that impacting KidMed?
Custódio: Access is going to continue to be an issue, and at KidMed we’ve been focused on only outpatient services and emergency care. Places like KidMed are going to be more in demand. That’s forcing us to look at opportunities to go into preventative care, some things that [parents and] caregivers will go to their primary care physician for, but the access is just not there, so we may have to consider expanding our services into that space.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
