05/05/2025
LANDFAIR SELECTED PHYSICIAN OF THE YEAR
By Dave Hoover | Staff Writer
Former U.S. Marine mechanic
South Florida Baptist Hospital (SFBH) selected Germanuel Landfair, M.D. M.S., as the 2025 Doctor of the Year. Dr. Landfair is a general orthopaedic surgeon with Orthopaedic Medical Group of Tampa Bay. Landfair specializes in total hip and knee replacements, and SFBH is the only hospital he visits.
The award was established in 2006 to recognize physicians who exemplify clinical excellence. They are typically physicians who have strong leadership skills and who foster collaboration among team members and clinical personnel.
The way the selection process worked is, SFBH patients, team members, and other physicians obtain nomination forms, fill them out, and drop them in a box in the Sweet Life Farms Strawberry Cafe in the facility. The Quality Council and the Quality Council nursing leadership then chooses the winner from the nominations. Dr. Landfair was selected for his, “commitment to kindness, patience, compassion, and excellent care of both our patients and team members.”
Landfair joined the U.S. Marine Corps out of high school. He spent most of his five years of service in Okinawa, Japan, as an aircraft mechanic who worked on repairing airframes, handling body work on helicopters, and fixing hydraulics and flight gear systems. “Funny, because I worked with mallets, drills, and saws—the same stuff I work with now,” he commented. “I didn’t know it at the time, but it led me on this pathway. I really like working with my hands.”
After the Marines, Landfair earned a degree in Movement Science (related to kinesiology) at the University of Michigan. The son of a firefighter, Landfair explored that option for the pay and benefits to take care of his daughter. But he also became interested in medicine. His daughter motivated him, and he wanted to set an example for her. “I was selected to go into the fire department, but I turned it down to pursue my studies in medicine,” Landfair said. “If you have something you dream, and aspire to do, you are going to have to make temporary sacrifices in order to achieve your goals.” At 26, the University of Michigan Medical School accepted him. He became most interested in orthopaedics in medical school. The he spent five years in residency at the Einstein Hospital in Philadelphia, followed by a fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania. In 2021, he joined the Orthopaedic Group of Tampa Bay, and moved to the area. He began performing surgeries at SFBH in 2024.
“The thing I like most about orthopaedics is that, with your own hands—whether it be with medicine, or therapy, or surgery, or casting, or other modalities that we do to treat people—you can directly influence people’s outcomes. I love the ability to have the chance to help people get better,” Landfair said. “It’s usually not a long-term thing—it’s usually something we can do in weeks to months, versus years, of trying to help somebody get better. That is one of the things I like specifically within orthopaedics. I see everything in general orthopaedics from the head to the toe, but my main surgical calling, and what I do on a daily basis is mostly hip and knee replacements. The thing I like about that is that we have the privilege of helping people get their function back. The majority of my patient population is people who are between 50 and 80. People who have worked hard their entire lives, and now they get to retirement age, but they can’t enjoy themselves because they have a bum hip or a bum knee. The ability to actually be able to help them play with their grandchildren, take their grandkids to Disney World, and actually be able to walk around—those simple things that we take for granted—is very meaningful to me, and that is what I get my enjoyment out of.” Landfair normally performs between eight and 14 surgeries a week.
“My philosophy in my vocation—I would call it a vocation, not a job—is treating everybody like you would want your family member, or yourself, to be treated. I think that is the basis of everything. If you can achieve that one thing, then you are going to order the right tests, you’re going to do surgery to the best of your abilities, you’re going to follow up with patients to make sure they are doing okay. Also, you want people to respect your family. If you can remember those things, you will do really well for most patients.”
In terms of the Doctor of the Year award, “I had no idea I was even up for it. I was in the middle of a case when they told me about it,” Landfair recalled. “And I thought, ‘Oh wow. That is very flattering.’ I am very honored and humbled. Usually surgeons are not selected for these types of awards because surgeons are usually thought of as hard-nosed, not very sociable, and strictly business. So, the idea, not only that I take good care of my patients, but that I am a person that they feel they can come to, and can relate to, is very flattering.”
Share This Post Facebook Pinterest Twitter LinkedinSouth Florida Baptist Hospital (SFBH) selected Germanuel Landfair, M.D. M.S., as the 2025 Doctor of the Year. Dr. Landfair is a general orthopaedic surgeon with Orthopaedic Medical Group of Tampa Bay. Landfair specializes in total hip and knee rep...
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