Biography
I grew up outside the small village of Suffern, NY, covered every summer in poison ivy. My grade school closed many years ago and a Walgreen’s now stands in its place. My high school, where I met wife in 10th grade homeroom, closed 3 years ago. I think it unlikely that Northwestern will close, but beware…
My academic career was unintended. After completing residency at Children’s Memorial Hospital (now Lurie Children’s Hospital) in June 1979 I was unsure of my future. I was hired as an emergency department moonlighter by my residency advisor, Todd Davis, and worked several shifts each week until the end of the year. My wife and I then spent the winter skiing the Rockies, traveling from mountain to mountain for downhill and cross-country skiing, and visiting national parks. (We skied the 4 “Mothers”: Alta, Taos, Aspen Mountain, and Jackson Hole in one season; but the best was cross-country skiing in the Yellowstone geyser basin while bison hung out nearby.) When we returned to Chicago in the spring there was an unexpected opening in general pediatrics and Todd hired me with the caveat that I would have to leave after one year. I retired after 40 years on the faculty of Children’s and Feinberg.
As a new faculty member without subspecialty training or experience, I focused on clinical care and medical student and resident education. For 20 years I was the director of the resident general pediatrics clinic. I was co-Associate Chair for Education and then Director of Medical Education in the Department of Pediatrics for 8 years. I continue to supervise and teach in the clinic 2 afternoons each week.
I had 2 unrelated research foci. I began to work with Kathy Christoffel on childhood injury. Over 20 years of collaboration we addressed child passenger safety and advocated in Springfield for the first car seat bill, received NIH funding for a multidisciplinary study of child pedestrian injuries, and investigated product-related injuries using data from the Consumer Product Safety Commission. We started the HELP (Handgun Epidemic Lowering Plan) Network to foster efforts to understand and address the epidemic of handgun injuries and deaths as a public health problem. Believing that data informs advocacy and policy, I directed the Data & Policy Program within the Violent Injury Prevention Center at Children’s – it still operates as the Child Health Data Lab at Lurie Children’s.
In 1980 I was recruited by Stan Shulman and Ram Yogev to work on a study related to group A streptococci, the cause of strep throat and other diseases. This has led to numerous studies and wonderful collaborations. I continue to work with Stan and colleagues at Lurie Children’s and at the CDC on this research.
A pediatrician must stay in touch with childhood. I coached little league baseball, youth softball, and youth basketball for a community organization. I then coached a middle school girls fastpitch softball team for 7 years. I was the official score keeper for a high school girls softball team for 3 years and then became the assistant coach of that team for 5 years. There was nothing better than being on the field every April in Chicago’s non-spring weather!
What now? I am an avid cyclist, riding 4 or 5 times each week with friends, and taking at least one week-long bike trip with them every year. I attend as many White Sox and Bulls games as I can. And I have spent much of the last 2 Covid winters in Phoenix playing grandpa to my granddaughter.